


Kinda Outta Luck

by PumpkinDoodles



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Punisher (TV 2017), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Darcy has a Gun Safe and Terrible Ex-Husband, F/M, Post-HYDRA Reveal, She Kept Her MIL and Fallon Though, The Punisher-Thor-Captain America Mashup Nobody Asked For, there is a cute dog
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-07
Updated: 2019-03-11
Packaged: 2019-10-05 19:57:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 38,789
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17331365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PumpkinDoodles/pseuds/PumpkinDoodles
Summary: “We need to get Rumlow out of hiding,” Fury said. “Thousands of people could die if we don’t.”“Yeah,” Darcy said. She could fill in the blanks.“He dislikes Captain Rogers,” Fury supplied.“If Brock gives a damn at all, he’ll dislike any Alpha that I bond with,” Darcy said. “It can be anybody.”“Are you volunteering, Lewis?” Fury said.“Darce--” Steve began.“If you’ll keep your mitts off Steve and not make his life more difficult, yes,” Darcy said.It was the typical crazy Nick Fury plan: Tie Steve out like a goat. In other words, bond Darcy Lewis to Steve Rogers to trap Brock Rumlow. Darcy's all for a plan that would see her ex-Alpha captured; she needs his whereabouts for an annulment, after all. But she doesn't know how Bucky Barnes would feel about his childhood love being bonded to his captor's ex. So, Darcy vetoes it and tells Fury to find somebody else.Who they find might be even scarier than Rumlow.





	1. Queen of Disaster

**Author's Note:**

> So, this weird plot bunny hopped into my head when I was looking up Rumlow's guns at the Internet Firearms Database for another WIP. It turns out Rumlow has good onscreen trigger discipline, i.e., he doesn't walk around all trigger happy. Thinking about guns made me think about Frank Castle, yadda yadda.

“Hey, Anatolia!” Darcy said cheerfully to the big grey pitbull sitting on the steps to her building. The dog wagged his tail. He was sitting next to a man with a dark beard in a plaid shirt.

“Anatolia?” Pete said. “Why the hell would I name him that?”

“Morning Pete,” Darcy said, depositing a travel mug of plain black coffee in the man’s hand. She stopped to pet the dog. It was part of their morning routine. “I was feeling very historic today,” she said. “Turkey is a fascinating place.” Pete gave her a skeptical look. He was always doing that. He refused to divulge the dog’s name, insisting he was simply called Dog. Darcy thought Pete probably had a secret, real name that he kept for himself alone, so everyday they played a guessing game. Today’s guess was Anatolia, yesterday’s had been Bob. The day before that, she’d guessed Pumpernickel.

“Nobody’s dog is named Anatolia, Shortstack,” Pete said, looking down into his coffee mug and then at her sideways. Darcy liked her crazy neighbor, even though Pete was purposefully grumpy. It had not escaped her notice that Pete’s constant steps-sitting deterred the sketchy people who’d lingered in the outside stairwells or the parking lot when she first moved into this apartment in DC. He guarded the whole damn building without fear, when he wasn’t gone to his construction job. Prototypical Alpha, she thought. Also, she knew he was an Alpha because he smelled so damn good to her: Pete was all cherry tobacco and hints of vanilla extract. It was sexy as hell. Occasionally, Darcy wondered if it would be bad manners to steal on of Pete’s baseball caps from the complex’s laundry room? Maybe a t-shirt?  Of course, Pete wore a ring—Darcy didn’t know if his Omega had left or died, although he’d mentioned her a few times in a way that made Darcy think it was the latter—and that, she supposed, was why he never made a move. Darcy wasn’t, well, _unattached_ herself.

She went to her mailbox, part of a cluster of metal boxes a few feet from the man and the dog. Darcy was waiting on an un-attachment letter, of sorts: she was consciously uncoupling from Brock Rumlow. Crossbones. Her Alpha. Who’d wooed her, bonded with her, turned out to be HYDRA, had a building fall on him, then, just as abruptly, escaped his hospital bed and abandoned her for a life of crime. Now she was petitioning the District of Columbia to formally dissolve their bond. Which was practically unheard of. Even abandoned mates didn’t usually do that. It was considered shameful or something? Darcy thought that was total bullshit, though. She was more ashamed to be the bondmate of a murderous Nazi thief who’d tried to kill Captain America than to be single, for freaking sake. She would be happily single and settle down with someone nice eventually. Despite the myth that broken bonds could kill the rejected one of a pair, Darcy felt healthy. Jane had actually anxiously tracked her vitals in the lab for a year: there was a tiny escalation in colds (Darcy: “Jane, it’s December, everyone gets the flu, I’m not dying of abandoned Omega sickness!”) in the first months, then Darcy was fine. Well, relatively fine. Finding out that the love of your life was a Nazi tended to be a depressing revelation. She’d wept on and off, lost fifteen pounds, and then started getting pissed. That had been when she set his clothes on fire. Or tried. Tactical gear was non-flammable. She kept his fancy car, though. It was paid for. She sold it on the advice of Nick Fury and bought something practical and bland Brock wouldn’t recognize, banking the difference.

 

“Shit,” Darcy said, seeing the letter in her mail. It was from the church, but it was suspiciously thin. In college applications, that was always a bad sign. In addition to bonding with her, Brock had insisted on a big church wedding with his whole family in New York. Now she was stuck asking the Catholic Church for an annulment, too. Darcy had never been particularly religious before, but she’d converted for Brock. She’d gone to RCIA. She’d been confirmed, learned to make her adorable mother-in-law Angela’s Sicilian recipes so well than even Angela was impressed, and even hunted down his favorite martial arts balms to treat his work bruises. She’d been a good wife. She’d adored him, the selfish asshole. Blushed like a dope when he introduced her to people as “my queen.” When the HYDRA Uprising happened, they’d actually been discussing timing for babies. Thank God that hadn’t happened.

“What’s wrong, Shortstack?” Pete said, walking over casually. He talked to her much more now than in the beginning. She had confided in him about Crossbones, since he spent mornings and evenings stoop sitting with Dog. She had been afraid that the two of them might get hurt if someone from HYDRA showed up, so Darcy had warned Pete to be careful. Later on, she began to suspect he as safe as anyone could be. He told her he’d been a Marine, though he was quiet about details, but she’d noticed that when he handled his gun that his trigger discipline was flawless, like Brock’s.

“The diocese needs more information before they’ll process my annulment request through this stage,” she said, sighing heavily. “They want his whereabouts? He’s a fugitive!”

“What’d he do, bribe a bishop to get them to drag their feet?” Pete said. Darcy looked at him in horror.

“No? He can’t bribe a bis--why are you laughing?” she said.

“You weren’t raised Catholic, were you?” Pete said wryly. “Crossbones could bribe the Pope.”

“You’re Catholic?” Darcy said.

“No, my Sicilian grandfather was one of the Mormon Castigliones, Lewis. What do you think?” he said. He was giving her his patented _listen to this girl’s bullshit?_ faces behind the beard.

“I converted for him,” she said, sighing.

“So leave the damn church, woman,” Pete said.

“No,” Darcy said, jutting her chin out. “I’ve switched apartments, I carry a gun, I moved, I-I wore a big poufy wedding dress and his grandmother’s huge antique veil and I learned to deep fry arancini for that man!” She stomped her foot in frustration. “I’m not letting him have this one. I’m Catholic now and I’ll have a big church wedding with my real, non-lying liar husband one day.”

“Arancini?” Pete said. “What kind of arancini?”

“Arancini con pistacchi. Pistachios. The mushroom ones, too. He liked unusual flavors,” Darcy said. “He was very picky about his Sicilian food.”

“Huh. My grandmother just made the ones with meat,” Pete said, leaning back a little.

“ _Al ragu_ _,"_ she said. "I made those, too, but he liked the other ones better. And zeppole,” Darcy said, half-lost in thought. Zeppole were traditional fried Italian donuts. “I learned to make really good zeppole with pastry cream filling. I got so many little freaking oil burns.”

“You ever make amaretti?” Pete asked. Darcy made a noise of frustration. “What?” he said. Amaretti were almond cookies. Done the way Brock liked them, they were as rich and sweet as shots of Disaronno, only in the form of tiny rounds.

“That asshole smelled like amaretti,” she said grumpily. “He took all the good almond things from me, Pete. I can’t eat them now without having marriage flashbacks. I deserve a damn annulment.”

“Well, what are you going to do about it?” Pete said wryly.

“Something,” Darcy said. She missed Pete’s skeptical expression.

 

***

 

Things at SHIELD’s new headquarters--limping along in the wake of the Uprising and controversial Congressional hearings--distracted Darcy from her annulment worries. Fury called her into a meeting in the mid-afternoon. “I only need you, Lewis,” he said, sounding extra-grouchy through the phone.

“Without Jane?” Darcy said, looking up at Jane from across the lab. Jane frowned. They’d joined SHIELD while HYDRA was still hiding. That was how she’d met Brock in the first place. He’d seduced her by being all cryptic and mysterious and beautiful and showering her with flowers and candy and sex. It had been intense. They’d been living together within three months, bonded in four, and married in six.

“Without Foster,” Fury said. “This is ex-husband related, you understand?”

“Oh,” Darcy said glumly. “Great.”  Just the idea of having a meeting about it made Darcy ugly-cry in the bathroom for a few minutes. Her husband had been addictive, but it turned out that recovering from that was bumpy, awkward, and well, ugly, she thought, as she wiped off her mascara streaks.

 

She tromped down to the conference room. When she entered, Fury was having a minor stand-off with Captain America. “I will not let you do this,” Steve was saying, all serious and righteously indignant. “She is not some goat you can tie out to lure in a lion--”

“Goat?” Darcy said. “Oh, God, Odin didn’t do something about Jane, did he?”

“Huh?” Steve said, looking baffled.

“Odin? He calls Jane a goat sometimes,” Darcy said.

“No,” Steve said, shaking his head. “Someone else has had an idea that ridiculous, however.” He looked at Nick frostily. “I object to this. This isn’t a mission, it’s a manipulation. She is his victim, Fury.”

“Who is?” Darcy said.

“Captain Rogers believes you’re a victim, Miss Lewis,” Fury said. “He thinks I’m taking an unnecessary risk--”

“You are,” Steve said.

“--by asking you to lure Rumlow out of hiding.”

“Oh,” Darcy said. “Wait, _I’m_ the goat?”

“Yes,” Steve said grimly. He jaw was working. “But I won’t let that happen, Darce. There’s got to be another plan. Find another plan, Fury.”

“Well, if you’re so incensed, Captain Rogers, maybe you should be the lure?” Fury suggested mildly. Darcy felt a spike of alarm. Something was up. Fury was too calm. Never trust a calm Fury, she and Jane had discovered. If he was calm, he was moving you like a chess piece. And now all Fury’s attention was focused on Steve. Not her.

“I will be,” Steve said, “to protect anyone he might harm.” His voice was firm.

“So, you’ll bond with Lewis?” Fury said, in that same smooth voice. “To lure Rumlow out of hiding?”

“What?” Steve said.

“Mother--” Darcy began, before she caught Steve’s surprised look. She seldom used typical swear words, preferring _shmuckdoodle_ , _asshat,_ and _freaking_ kidding. “You’re trying to trick Steve into being the goat!” Fury gave her a _shut up, Lewis_ look.

Steve’s face was doing all kinds of funny things. Darcy knew that this was not in Steve’s current lifeplan. Steve was in love with and searching for Bucky Barnes. Bucky, on the run from HYDRA, might not want his childhood best friend turned wartime lover to be bonded to his _freaking captor’s ex-wife._ Bucky was already spooked and skittish. What if he heard about it and fled even more from Steve? “No!” Darcy said forcefully. She glared at Fury.

“What?” Steve said, looking surprised at Darcy’s volume and intensity.

“You are not doing that to Steve. You know damn well who he’s looking for and what it might do to him to find Steve bonded to Rumlow’s ex-wife. Are you crazy?” she said, coming over and poking Fury aggressively in the chest. Behind her, Steve chuckled slightly.

“She’s got your number, Nick. For a minute there I thought you didn’t like me, Darce,” Steve said. He was smiling at her.

“Of course I like you, Steve”--Darcy would have climbed those good shoulders and Steve smelled charmingly like a Coke float on a hot day, right down to the bubbles--”but you, I’m mad at you right now,” she told Fury. “Why would you even do that?”

“Terrorism,” Steve said grimly. “We’ve got intel that he’s looking at biochemical weapons.”

“Oh,” Darcy said.

“We need to get Rumlow out of hiding,” Fury said. “Thousands of people could die if we don’t.”

“Yeah,” Darcy said. She could fill in the blanks.

“He dislikes Captain Rogers,” Fury supplied.

“If Brock gives a damn at all, he’ll dislike any Alpha that I bond with,” Darcy said. “It can be anybody.”

“Are you volunteering, Lewis?” Fury said.

“Darce--” Steve began.

“If you’ll keep your mitts off Steve and not make his life more difficult, yes,” Darcy said. “Make a list of male Alphas. I prefer men to women.”

 

***

 

“Are you out of your fucking mind?” Pete said to Darcy that night. She’d invited him to dinner. She did that so she could pet Dog. Also, she was a little scared to tell Jane and she needed to confide in somebody. Jane was going to have a hissy fit at the news that Darcy was going to bond with a stranger--even temporarily--to see if that might bring Brock into SHIELD custody. She could bring Pete into the circle of trust because he kept an eye on the building. A plan was being drawn up to move in her ostensible new mate and a SHIELD team into the recently vacated apartment down the hall.

“What?” Darcy said. “We can break it later. My bond with Rumlow has been officially de-recognized, so I’m technically single again. The DC registrar emailed me today. I think Fury called them. All I’ve got left is the annulment. I gave all his stuff to his mom.”

“Bullshit,” Pete said, shaking his head.

“If they capture him, the church will have his whereabouts,” Darcy said. “That’s the information they need.”

“If they capture him,” Pete said, looking at her with his chin tilted up aggressively, “you’ll be making conjugal visits to the SuperMax--”

“Ahhh, what?” Darcy said, flicking her dishtowel at Pete. He smirked.

“You’re in love with Crossbones. Don’t shake your head at me. He wouldn’t hurt you so bad if you weren’t. That’s what love does, Shortstack. Gives the person you love the ability to just”--he looked down at his hands--”reach into your chest and pull out your heart. Man, I envy you that--”

“You envy me? He’s a criminal and a mercenary,” Darcy said, raising her eyebrows.

“You’ve still got a chance. He’s alive. I’d do anything--anything--to have my wife back. To have that again. She could hurt me and hurt me and everyday I’d wake up wanting more. Trust me, when you can never have that again, you’ll know how much you’re still in love,” Pete said.

“Seriously?” Darcy said.

“My wife could be a Nazi and shoot the president, Shortstack. Wouldn’t matter, as long as she was breathing,” he said.

“You and I have very different ideas of love,” Darcy said. “I’m beginning to regret bringing you into the circle of trust.” He scoffed.

“That’s because you want your love to be all neat and pretty and shit. Real life isn’t pretty. It’s messy and chaotic and unfair. Right now, there’s somebody bleeding out in Yemen, trying to keep their starving infant alive, while you make me magazine food, kid,” he said.

“Jesus Christ, Pete,” Darcy said, reflexively looking at Dog in alarm.

“If you’re gonna be a real Catholic, you have to stop being so damn bloodless. The miracle happens _after_ the suffering,” he said, cutting open one of Darcy’s zucchini fritters. “It’s a necessary precursor to the miracle being a miracle.” He waved his knife. “Stop refusing to acknowledge it,” he said.

“So, you think I should go back to Rumlow?” Darcy said, gobsmacked. Pete looked at her.

“What do you think?” he said. He looked at his plate. “Look at this fucking food.”

“What’s wrong with it? Is it bad?” she asked, sitting up. She’d made zucchini fritters and pesto alla trapanese out of habit.

“It’s perfect,” he said, shaking his head. “You aren’t making perfect food for me. I’ll eat anything. This is his damn zucchini.”

“Shit,” Darcy said. They were recipes from Angela, Brock's mother.

He only made fun of her a little for how good her zabaglione was. “Don’t feed it to the dog,” she told him, “it has moscato d’Asti in it.”

“What, he’s not old enough to drink?” Pete said.

“He’s, like, two. That’s fourteen in dog years. You’re contributing to the delinquency of a minor,” she said. He grinned briefly. Darcy heard her phone alert with a SHIELD-specific tone and looked at it. “This is them.”

“Them who?” Pete said.

“My Alpha agent matches,” Darcy said, getting out a tablet and flicking through the screens thoughtfully. “I don’t want it to be Thompson, he has kids, Rodriguez won’t work, he had that ankle injury last year. I don’t know about Jones. He’s a good shot, but his hand-to-hand experience is nonexistent--”

“His hand-to-hand experience?” Pete said, raising an eyebrow.

“This is what my ex can do,” Darcy said, tapping the screen to pull up his file. “Brock--”

“Brock?” he said, snorting. “Crossbones’s real name is Brock?”

“His mom liked soap operas, she’s a very nice woman,” Darcy said. “He’s named for someone from _The Young & the Restless, _ I think? His sister is named Fallon, like the _Dynasty_ character.”

“You stay in touch with your mother in law?” Pete said.

“She’s very nice, really, I don’t know how he became whatever he is,” Darcy said. “He ghosted on her, too. She misses him.”

“Uh-huh,” he said.

“You met her once when I was moving in. Angela with the scarves? She petted Dog. She rescues beagles,” Darcy said.

“That was Crossbones’s mom?” Pete said.

“Yeah,” Darcy said.

“Well, shit, she was very pleasant,” he said, laughing. “I thought she was like your aunt or some shit.”

“As I was saying,” Darcy said, still slightly affronted, “Brock is smart and strong. He doesn’t just rob nice lady bank tellers and steal stuff. He survived the HYDRA serum trials, so he’s enhanced. Not as much as Steve, but he survived an entire building collapse.”

“Serum trials, huh?” Pete said.

“88.9% percent of the HYDRA volunteers died,” Darcy said. “It was in Natasha’s leak. We think he has higher pain tolerance now, too.” She turned the tablet to face Pete and tapped the screen. Pete read through Brock’s records, frowning. There were photos of Bucky’s chair, mission kill counts, range records, surveillance from Fort Lehigh of Brock climbing through building wreckage like a well armed freaking gazelle or something; him pursuing and arresting Captain America. Darcy had looked at it all. Countless times. There was even a few seconds of video Darcy had shot of him on their honeymoon in Mexico, when he’d free-hand climbed a cliff without ropes. In the background, you could hear her terrified squeals. He’d just done it for the thrill. Darcy heard his voice over the footage, laughing and telling her he was fine. Then you could hear Darcy cussing and yelling. That had been the part where he let go with one hand and dangled, forty feet above her, like it was a _Mission Impossible_ movie. She’d almost had a fit, it had scared her so badly. Darcy’s chest tightened when she heard his voice again, warm with laughter:  
  
_“Baby, baby, I’m fine. Don’t cry. What you hitting me for?_ ”

_“You scared me to death---”_

“You can fast-forward to the next file,” Darcy told Pete. He thumbed at the screen. Finally, Pete got to the combat footage. It was a video that spliced Brock’s actions on the last day at Triskelion: holding a gun on the techs, cutting Sharon Carter with the knife hidden in his tactical boots, shooting a roomful of agents, launching the helicarriers, and making his way up the stairwells alone, against what appeared to be more than a dozen armed agents. She listened to his threats during the final fight with Sam Wilson. Pete’s expression grew darker and darker. “The man he’s fighting with there is the Falcon now,” she told Pete. “One of the Avengers, former Air Force. He’s a good dude. Runs a veterans’ support group.”

“And your ex is winning,” Pete said flatly as the helicarrier came through the window. Darcy looked away for a minute.

“Yeah, if the helicarrier hadn’t happened--” She let the sentence trail off. _Sam would be dead,_ she thought.

“What’s this?” Pete asked. The next footage was grainier.

“Hospital video feeds. He was under armed police guard and had burns to eighty percent of his body,” she said.

“There’s you leaving,” Pete said. “It looks like he’s unconscious.”

“I thought that he was,” Darcy said. She’d been yelling at him when she thought he couldn’t hear her, telling him that she wanted a divorce, that he was the worst decision she’d ever made--Pete twitched. The was a bang sound from the tablet. “He shot both the cops watching his hospital room. They lived, but--” she said.

“Whoever volunteers to be your next Alpha might not,” Pete said. Darcy nodded.

“Maybe? They need it to be someone fit enough to fend off an attack, Steve was very insistent,” she said.

“Steve who?” he said.

“Captain Steve,” she said, gesturing to the poster hanging near her guest bathroom in the apartment. It was a vintage-look copy of a 1940s one she’d gotten as a joke. Pete whistled.

“That Steve, huh?” he said.

“Fury wanted him to be the guy,” Darcy said. “But my ex was holding the love of Steve’s life prisoner, so I didn’t think that would be helpful to Steve’s future--”  Pete looked at her as if she’d grown two heads.

“What is wrong with you? If this man comes for you here--shit, anywhere, you’ve got no chance alone. No chance whatsoever. You turned down _Captain America’s_ protection--” he began scoldingly. Then he froze.

“What?” she said.

“Shut up. Get the dog and get in the bathtub,” Pete said. A gun had materialized in his hand when he brought it from under her dining table. “Go.”

 

Darcy got in the tub with Dog and hit her tracker emergency bracelet. A few seconds later, she heard the shots. She texted her DC emergency list, too--Steve, Natasha, Thor:

 

_My neighbor Pete is investigating a disturbance at my apartment. I think he just shot them. Please hurry, but don’t shoot Pete. I’m in my tub with his pitbull._

 

***

 

Steve surveyed the dead men in the hallway. “Are they Rumlow’s?” he asked Natasha. He had smelled the intense scent of another Alpha in rage before he even entered the building, mixed with the coppery tang of still-warm blood. He’d thought for a moment that Rumlow--Rumlow who’d held his Bucky and tortured him--was here, had to be here, before he realized the scent wasn’t Rumlow’s characteristic bitter almonds smell, but a weirdly burnt tobacco note. The smell of it had almost made Steve recoil when he turned down Darcy’s hallway. A strong scent. Pungent with hostility.

“No,” she said.  “I do not think they were here for her, Steve,” Nat said. “I recognize them as Cooleys and O’Haras. Irish mafia.” She was looking curiously at the man sitting at Darcy’s table, visible through the open apartment door, as the SHIELD team milled around, taking photographs of the crime scene. The man was the source of the smell, Steve realized. There was aggression rolling off him in waves. His entire body was tense with coiled anger and violence. His clothes had visible blood on them and there was a bloody knife in front of him on the table.

“Why are the Irish mafia in Darcy’s apartment?” Steve said. She didn’t reply. Natasha was already moving gracefully into the apartment. The man looked up as if he didn’t see her.

“You are Frank Castle,” she said coolly. “They gave you a pardon last year, resettled you into civilian life.”

“Shit,” Pete said.

“What?” Steve said, horrified. Darcy’s head jerked up from where she was leaning against Dog.

“You’re--you’re the Punisher?” Darcy stuttered. “I brought the Punisher into the circle of trust?”

“Those men were Irish mafia, here for you, and you killed them with one gun, alone?” Nat asked, gesturing to the bodies behind her.

“I had a Kimber Warrior,” he said, shrugging. “And a combat knife in my work boots. That’s plenty.” He lapsed back into a stony and alarming silence.

“A Kimber what?” Darcy said, looking up at Steve with wide blue-green eyes.

“A handgun, Darce,” Steve said quietly.

“Oh,” Darcy said back. “I forgot.” Steve was looking at Pete very carefully. Steve was gauging the distance between Darcy and her alarmingly lethal neighbor. He’d read the reports about the Punisher. Cartel men on meat hooks, an entire bar of dead Irish mafia, those bikers. If he needed Darcy to move when Castle lost it--

 

“Look at that, Itty Bitty’s found another one,” a voice said behind them. Darcy’s head swiveled behind Steve. Steve half-turned. Clint Barton was leaning against her door frame, eating an apple.

“Don’t eat in my crime scene,” one of the SHIELD techs scolded. “We’ve got six bodies here.”

“Awww, man,” Clint said, spraying little apple bits. The tech recoiled.

“I will call Hill,” he threatened. Clint scooted into the apartment, looking aggrieved. He made what Steve thought were rude ASL signs at the tech. Castle was back to staring off into space, seemingly indifferent to the blood on him.

“What are you doing here?” Steve said. Clint had retired. The archer shrugged.

“I was in town, heard it on my old SHIELD scanner,” Clint said. “Was worried about you,” he told Darcy. “But, you know, everything looks fine.” He wagged his eyebrows at Pete.

“Why is some asshole with arrows here?” Castle said, his fog seeming to lift. When Steve looked back, Castle was studying Clint, tilting his head. Steve could smell the aggression and irritation he was practically sweating.

“What, does nobody remember Hawkeye?” Clint said. “Itty Bitty, your new boyfriend is hurting my feelings.”

“I’m not her boyfriend,” Castle said. He rose and shoulder checked Steve before pausing. “Dog, c’mon,” he said gruffly. The momentary pause gave Natasha time to bar the doorway.

“Nat--” Steve began. He wanted to evacuate Darcy out of the building, away from Frank Castle. She needed a safe house.

“I have a question for you,” Natasha said smoothly.

“I have a pardon, I’m fucking done with questions,” Castle told the redhead. Natasha didn’t flinch.

“You don’t have a pardon for this, Mr. Castle,” a voice said from the hallway. Nick Fury was standing at the other end in one of his dark jackets. “Ask your question, Romanoff.”

“Would you like to be Darcy’s temporary Alpha?” Natasha said.


	2. Change

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for your comments and support! Y'all are the best!

“What the fuck?” Castle said, just as Steve made some sort of noise that Darcy could only describe as an irate rhino huff at Natasha’s question.

“She needs someone talented enough to fend off Rumlow and his men,” Natasha said.

“And you appear to have the necessary talent,” Fury said, stepping around two bodies.

“I’m a civilian now,” Pete--Frank Castle, she mentally corrected--insisted. “I work construction.”

“Seems like a waste to me,” Fury said.

“He hates when people waste their talents,” Clint said, biting into his apple with an audible crunch. Frank was glaring at them, Darcy saw.

“I’m getting the fuck out of here,” Frank said, patting his fingers on his thigh to call the dog. Darcy could see blood on his hands. She let go of the pitbull, who followed him, nails clattering on the floor.

“Consider my offer, Mr. Castle. Every man needs a job,” Fury said.

“Fuck off.” Frank’s door slammed. Darcy felt distressed: one, there was a fuckton of dead people in her building; two, the smell of blood and dueling Alpha-in-high-alert scents--Frank, Steve, Fury, Nat, even the dead guys in the hallway who smelled like themselves, plus dying tissue and the scents that sometimes accompanied death--was making her queasy; and three, she was worried about Frank. Really worried.

“Have you lost your goddamned mind?” Steve said to Fury.

“Ooooh, Steve,” Clint said. “I gotta call Laura, tell her Cap cussed.” He reached for his phone, grinning at a still-dazed Darcy.  “You okay, Itty Bitty?” he asked.

“Yeah,” Darcy said, knitting her hands. It was a nervous habit. The argument between Cap, Fury, and Nat increased in intensity. They were being quiet--Steve’s voice had turned abruptly icy, Natasha was muttering Russian curses, and Fury was mostly silent--but she could smell them. The techs in the hallway were starting to stare, too. Darcy slipped out of her apartment and snuck into Frank’s, a few doors down. Dog met her. “Are you hungry?” she asked the dog. Frank was staring at nothing. She started making the dog’s food. She’d watched him for Frank before, for reasons that now seemed oddly ominous. Dog was pushing his metal bowl across the kitchen floor, tail thumping, when Darcy grabbed a fistful of paper towels, dampened them with warm water, and knelt in front of Frank on the couch.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Feeding your dog and getting the blood off your hands,” she said, wiping his fingers gently. The blood had already started to dry. It was brownish and streaky. She rubbed his palms as softly as she could, worked the paper towel down his strong forearm, then the other. He was silent for several minutes as she cleaned him up. “I’m sorry, P--Frank,” she corrected. “I wouldn’t want you to do anything that would hurt you,” she said, carefully moving around his wedding ring.

“Hurt me?” he said flatly. His expression was blank. He looked down at her quizzically.

“I know you consider yourself a married man. It was wrong for Natasha to ask--” she said. He cut her off.

“I am married,” he said, pulling his hand away roughly. “And if Maria had ever caught me being somebody else’s Alpha, even temporarily, she would have shot me,” he said. “And she would have wiped the streets with you in your little pancake socks and your weird music. You’re no Maria, that’s for fucking sure. She was a real woman. A tough woman. Raised two kids while I was away, worked full-time.”

“Yeah,” Darcy said gently. “I know how devoted you are to her, Frank.” She’d already known that he was sensitive about his wife--that was why she’d never asked too many questions. Her own mother had been that way about Darcy’s late grandparents. Even mentioning them had often made her cry, so Darcy had been careful about how she talked about them and when. Knowing he was really Frank Castle made that sensitivity all the clearer.

“Am I?” Frank said in a raw voice. He was closer to tears than she’d realized. “I left her time and time again on deployment. I let somebody--I was there and I didn’t--” He leaned towards her and then seemed to catch himself. A guilty expression stole across his face. He pressed a palm against his forehead and rocked a little. “You--you need to go. Go,” he said.

“Okay,” she said, rising. “I won’t let them bother you again, all right? You’ll be okay.” She rose to leave the apartment and missed Frank’s sharp, incredulous look in her direction.

She stomped out into the hallway and glared at Fury. “You are not to bother that man. He is not a SHIELD employee. You let him be or I’ll tase you until you beg for death, you understand me?” she said hotly. She felt protectively mad on Frank’s behalf. Steve was grinning at her, but then his smile fell a fraction. Natasha did that thing where her face smoothed over into a placid, deceptively innocent look. Fury leaned back. Darcy smelled rather than saw Frank behind her. He seized her arm and pulled her back into the apartment. When she turned, he was breathing heavily. Darcy stared up at him. He’d gone from catatonic stillness to—to whatever this was in a minute.

 

“Frank--” she started to say, as he towed her to the couch and sat her down. She could feel herself getting all flushed. Frank was pumping out Alpha hormones like some sort of sexual factory. And he smelled _good._ In the isolation of his apartment, that vanilla-tobacco smell was particularly alluring. She leaned forward instinctively and inhaled. Her brain _mmm’d._

“Shut up,” he said flatly. “You think you can protect _me?”_ His voice was astonished. Darcy looked up, surprised. He was glaring down at her. Dog peered at them from where he was licking his now-empty bowl.

“Yes,” Darcy said in what she hoped was a soothing voice. “I won’t let SHIELD harass you, I promise. Okay? I know you’re trying to lay low, you’re not ready for this, emotionally--” She made to get up.

“No,” he said. “Sit down. You--you can’t protect anybody. I’ve seen you lose a fight with a goddamned cardigan, trying to carry your coffee. You need protection from those jackasses and their half-assed plans to lure out your crazy ex.” Darcy was momentarily stunned. She stared at Frank. He gave her one of his ‘I can’t believe your bullshit’ faces again.

“We’ll find somebody,” Darcy insisted, ignoring the jibe about the time he’d seen her drop her coffee trying to rush out the door and put on her coat at the same time.

“Yeah, right,” Frank said abrasively. He was abrasive. Like being rubbed with sandpaper, Darcy thought. Maybe not that bad. But something slightly rough. Knotty towels, sugar scrubs, beach sand, her brain supplied, making her think of bare, warm skin. She shook off the thought train. Too sexual. It was his scent, having this effect on her.

“Stop lecturing me, Frank,” she said, calling up irritation to distract herself. “I’m not a child.”

“You wear polka dots,” he said in agitation. “And ridiculous socks. You’re no match for--for whatever will happen when your husband realizes you’ve moved on without him.”

“That’s what the agent will be for,” Darcy said stubbornly, offended at the insult to her socks and her preparedness skills. Besides, of course, she knew that Brock could take her whenever he wanted. The thought had given her nightmares for months, before she’d had the realization that _he wasn’t coming back because he didn’t care._ That had been worse, in some ways. Knowing that she’d loved him so much and he didn’t give a damn about her.

“You need to have a plan--” Frank was saying, in an aggressive voice. How come the only gentle Alpha she knew was Steve? Was it the decline in manners since his day or something? The rest of them were pushy-pushy-pushy all the time. It was so exhausting. Brock had been exhausting like that, too, but he’d had a sixth sense, probably honed by his natural duplicity, of when to stop and let shit go. Or start taking his clothes off. That had really been his preferred method for keeping her calm and amenable when she pressed him about inconsistencies in his life. He’d fucked her into cuddly compliance and dopey infatuation. She’d fallen for it like a complete idiot. She missed it, also like a complete idiot.

“I’ll have an Alpha SHIELD agent as a permanent bodyguard,” she said calmly, trying not to take the bait, lose her temper.

“Oh, yeah, the guy who twisted his ankle?” Frank said.

“Ugh, God, you are such a typical Alpha,” she complained, giving up the serene act. “Always a smartass, always a pain. You know better than me what I’m up against, huh?”

“You nag like that, no wonder your husband left you,” Frank said roughly.

“Fuck you,” Darcy said. The paper towels she’d cleaned his hands with were still on the coffee table. She threw them at him. He stared at her for a long moment, just looking befuddled. Then Frank smirked.  

“You’d have to,” he said.

“What?” Darcy said.

“We’ll have to fuck to make this believable,” he said. “Eventually.”

“Wh-what?” she said, her mouth dropping open.

“I’m going to say yes to your boss, then take a shower.” Darcy stared at him.

“Why are you doing this?” she said.

“Because anyone stupid enough to try to protect me needs a goddamn battalion and a really good shrink, Shortstack. And I’ve seen what your husband--”

“Ex-husband,” Darcy corrected.

“What your husband”--he stressed the last word--”can do. He was a SHIELD agent, he’ll know everything important,” Frank said. “How they communicate, what the natural defensive moves are, how they’ll fall back, who all the agents are. He has the best intel of anybody alive about how a SHIELD agent trying to protect you will behave. There’s no better position than being a fucking mole.”

“Yeah,” Darcy admitted.

“He doesn’t know me,” Frank said.

“No,” Darcy said, “he doesn’t.”

“Then we’re in agreement here?” He paused. “Unless you have an objection to me personally?” he said, looking slightly defensive and yet vulnerable behind that dark beard.

“No, no objection,” Darcy said, thinking of the mornings they’d joked and she’d brought him coffee, the way he smelled, how much he loved his dog, and strange sympathy she felt for him most of the time. But one thing nagged at her. “Frank?”

“Yeah?” he said.

“You’re married,” she reminded him. “What about that?”

“This is a job, Lewis. My job is to protect you. It’s a security job with physical challenges,” he said.

“Challenges?” she said.

“Components. Your job is to not get too attached to me,” Frank said.

“Real modest,” she said, making a scoffing noise.

“Yeah, that’s me,” he said, disappearing into the hallway. She heard him tell Fury it was settled, then he came back inside. He was stripping his shirt off already. Darcy stared. Frank was more cut than the Punisher armor let on. “I’m going to shower,” he said. “Then we’ll talk.”

“Yeah,” Darcy said, feeling warm again at the sight of Frank’s torso. He looked at her looking, then glanced down at himself.

“I got blood on my clothes,” he said, sighing.

“Why were those guys after you?” she called.

“I killed their cousins, maybe.”

“Oh,” she said, patting Dog.

“They were threatening Dog at the time,” he said, leaning out of the bedroom. He pants were half unbuttoned. She could see the line of dark hair to his groin and the waistband of his briefs. “With a drill,” Frank said bitterly, the rage evident in his voice. Darcy automatically pulled the dog a little closer. Dog sniffled at her cheek and looked less alarmed than she felt.

“Irish mafia fuckers,” Darcy said venomously.

“Uh-huh,” Frank said. “They’re dead now.”

  


He left again and she heard the shower running, then the sounds of him brushing his teeth and shaving. She went outside and discussed logistics with Fury for a few minutes, then came back into Frank’s apartment to wait. Vaguely, she thought she heard a pair of clippers, but she was half-asleep, curling up against Dog. All her adrenaline had run out. Also, she felt safe in this apartment. As safe as she was capable of feeling, anyway.

 

***

 

Jane and Thor--they had been having a romantic dinner in the suburbs and missed Darcy’s texts--arrived as the last body was carried out and the SHIELD techs decamped. “Where’s Darcy?” Jane said, terrified.

“She’s fine, she’s fine,” Steve said comfortingly. Darcy had not yet come out of Frank’s apartment. Steve had been trying to listen without intruding, not wanting to pry, but carefully monitoring in case Darcy called for help. So far, he’d only heard Frank showering and the gentle wheeze of Darcy and the friendly pitbull snoring.

“Did you know her neighbor was Frank Castle?” Natasha asked casually.

“What?” Jane said, baffled.

“The one with the cool dog?” Clint offered.

“You mean Pete the constructor work--” Jane stuttered, as Steve nodded.

“He is going to be her new Alpha,” Natasha said. When Jane made an inchoate sound of rage, Thor rubbed her comfortingly.

“It’s just temporary, Janey. Fury thinks he can lure Rumlow out of hiding,” Steve said.

“Where is that one-eyed sonofa--” Jane said, before Fury stepped into the hallway.

“Hello, doctor, your royal highness,” he said. Jane whirled on him and marched down, towing a frowning Thor behind her.

“What do you think you’re doing to Darcy?” she said.

 

Jane was yelling at Fury when a sleepy-looking Darcy stuck her head out of Pete’s apartment. “Jane? Is that you?” she said. Jane ran to her and enveloped her in a hug.

“Are you okay?” Jane said.

“Yeah,” Darcy said. “I was asleep on Frank’s couch with Dog.” At the sound of voices, Dog poked his head out and wagged his tail at Thor. The Asgardian knelt and called the dog. They were friendly. Well, at least Jane and Thor were acquainted with the pitbull. Pete, on the other hand, had always been a rude, disgruntled sort of smartass, Jane thought. And now he was Frank Castle? Jane’s mind was spinning.

“Fury told me. Darce, you don’t have to do this. It’s his job to catch Rumlow, not yours. You don’t need to bond with Frank Castle, of all people,” Jane said, incredulous.

“He’ll protect me, Jane,” Darcy said. “There’s nobody better equipped to fend off Brock, you know that. And he made a good case--”

“A good case?” Jane said. She had no idea what Darcy was thinking, except that her assistant--her quirky, funny assistant who liked boxed mac ‘n cheese and latte-themed socks--seemed to have an irresistible attraction to terrible men. Awful, terrible men. Jane had spent all of Darcy’s relationship with that Nazi STRIKE smartass just waiting for the other shoe to drop. He had a sneaky smirk and she’d never fully trusted Brock Rumlow, even when he was doing a flawless impression of a besotted man. Now it was Frank Castle? _Frank Castle?!_

“Brock will know exactly what a SHIELD agent will do,” Darcy said, “but he has no idea what Frank Castle will do.”

“Neither do you,” Jane said. “Until a few hours ago, you thought his name was Pete! Steve, Steve, help me,” Jane pleaded, “this is madness. We cannot just let her do this again!”

“Do what again?” Darcy said, puffing up a little. It was a sure sign that she was offended, but Jane carried on.

“Get involved with another one!” Jane said. The door to Pete’s--Jane still thought of him as Pete somehow--opened more widely. Pete-slash-Frank was standing there in jeans and a tank. He looked at Jane. Jane looked at him.

“Another one what?” he said. He’d shaved off his beard and trimmed the sides of his hair. He was unrecognizable. She raked her eyes from his face to his muscular torso and finally, to his heavy black combat boots.

“Oh my God,” Jane said. “Even his damned ugly shoes are the same!”

“You think my shoes are ugly?” he said.

“She means you look like Rumlow,” Natasha said.

“Oh,” he said, “yeah.” Castle shrugged. He rubbed the side of his freshly-shaved jaw and Jane made a weird strangled noise. Brock Rumlow had a habit of rubbing his jaw like that when he drank. It was like a weird tic.

  


***

 

“Frank, what happened?” Darcy said, once Jane had stormed off, trailed by the rest of SHIELD, and they were alone again. They had instructions from Fury.

“Huh?” he said. He tilted his head at her. It was a backwards sort of motion with the top of his head. He seemed to lead with his chin. He had a strong jawline, she realized.

“You look different,” she said finally.

“I look like your husband, like Jane said,” he said dryly.

“On purpose?” Darcy said. He shrugged.

“Some.”

“Yeah,” Darcy said.

“And the beard’s no good for what we need to do,” he said. “You’re on suppressants, right?”

“Yeah,” Darcy said. “You?”

“Yeah,” he said. She was surprised.

“You did that”--she pointed to the hallway--”on chemical restraints?”

“Yeah,” he said. “That’s why I’m the right man for this job.”

“Uh-huh,” Darcy said, trying not to imagine what he’d do when not on them.

“Get to bed, Lewis. You can barely stand, you’re so tired.”

 

Darcy followed him into her bedroom. She’d painted it tropical pink. She thought pink would make her happier. “Interesting color,” he said.

“It’s called Scrumptious,” she said. “Ol--Olympic paint.” In her warm bedroom, he seemed even more Alpha-ish. Dark. Masculine.  

“Is it?” Frank said, smirking, as he surveyed her things. Nothing matched, but everything was bright: pinks, butter yellows, sea blues. She had twinkle lights she’d strung over the blue headboard and photos of the places she and Jane had been.

“I thought it would be good for my moods,” Darcy admitted. Frank chuckled.

“How’d you end up with Crossbones?”

“He, uh, pursued me,” she said. “At work.”

“And you just let him, huh?” Frank said.

“No,” Darcy said. “I’m not a doormat type of Omega, okay?”

“You just made all his favorite foods, befriended his mom, converted for him, but you, you’re not a doormat sort of Omega?” he said wryly. “How’s that now?”

“Look, if I didn’t want him to pursue me, I would have tased him until he peed himself and he’d have gotten a clue,” Darcy said sharply. “I’m not some helpless little woman.”

“So, you liked it?” he said, chuckling.

“What?” Darcy said, surprised by his shift in tone.

“You liked having the meanest, baddest, scariest husband in all of SHIELD?” Frank said, almost teasingly.

“Maybe,” Darcy admitted. “He was fun.”

“He shot people while jumping out of planes for fun,” Frank said. “And you loved it. People say I’m crazy, Shortstack, but I dunno, I don’t have a girl boner for Crossbones--”

“Shut up, Frank,” she said. “I’m going to bed. Are you sleeping here?”

“What?” he said.

“We’re going to have to start pretending to be a couple now,” she said.

“Uh-huh. I’ll sleep on the couch,” he said.

“Here,” she said, handing him two of the pillows. He sniffed them, looking dubious. “What?” Darcy said.

“They smell like you,” he said.

“Duh,” she said.

“It’s like a damn bakery,” Frank groused, walking away.

“Is that what I smell like?” she said. Brock had always teasingly refused to tell her how she smelled, it had been a thing with him.

“Fucking vanilla cupcakes. You’re a walking diabetic coma,” he told her. She could hear him as his weight hit her couch.

“Gee, thanks, Frank.”

“The Pillsbury Doughboy has his nose pressed up against your window, Shortstack. He thinks you’re a Twinkie factory. Wait, I think I see my old lawyer, too--” he joked.

“Are you making jokes about the blind?” Darcy said, shocked.

“No, no, the other one. The blonde one who liked pie,” he said.

“No fat shaming or dessert scolding, Frank!” Darcy yelled. “House rule!”

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These real on-set shots from S2 of the Punisher are my post-haircut Frank & Dog headcanon for this story. Note boots: http://www.zimbio.com/photos/Jon+Bernthal/Jon+Bernthal+Set+Punisher/lurvl_w3peI
> 
> Story title and each chapter title = the mood-appropriate Lana del Rey song. Just because.


	3. Without You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos!

Frank’s first day at SHIELD went as expected: he brought Dog, which delighted Thor and a still-around Clint, and put his feet on tables, which pissed Jane off. Darcy had to run a little interference between them, but Frank’s sarcastic attitude didn’t bother her. She thought it was at least real when he teased her about her fancy girl taste in coffees and seemed to eye her cleavage. She’d just bribed Jane with a round of Pop-Tarts when Frank shifted abruptly.

“Going to teach the college kids new tricks,” he said sarcastically, taking his feet off one of Jane’s equipment crates with a thud and standing. His back cracked. “I’ll be back,” he told Darcy, dropping a hand on the top of her head and raking his hand through her hair.

“Okay,” she said, leaning back reflexively and looking up at him. They’d been practicing making small affectionate gestures--holding hands, touching each other--to make them seem natural. Things were still awkward. But it matched Frank somehow: his stiff gate and the way he led with his chin didn’t lend themselves to tender gestures. He looked down at her for a long moment, expression odd. He had a way of frowning that made his nose seem particularly flat in contrast to his cheekbones. It made him look more like Dog, ironically.

“Stop going dopey, Lewis, I haven’t even marked you yet,” he said brusquely.

“I‘m not, I don’t do that,” she insisted.

“Sure you do,” he said.

“You act like you don’t stare at my boobs,” Darcy said.

“Yeah, well, when you advertise the merchandise right up against the window, a man’s gonna look when he walks by,” he said.

“Are you saying my clothes aren’t classy?”

“No, but it does look like you’re baking bread in your bra,” he said, chuckling.

“Shut up,” Darcy said.

“Bet she gets a lotta rise during the workday, huh?” Frank said, looking at Jane. She grimaced.

 

“I hate him,” Jane announced, after he’d gone.

“Janey--”

“I’m serious, he makes Brock look like Prince Charming,” she said.

“Yeah,” Darcy admitted. “He’s kinda an asshole. But I need closure with Brock.”

“Darce, sleeping with that man will not make you any less in love with your real husband,” Jane said, sighing.

Frank’s cover was that he was courting Darcy when she discovered his identity and SHIELD recruited him to teach the agents how to kill lots of people when alone in the field. Technically, he was being employed as a “combat consultant.” It gave him a reason to be with Darcy all the time and--she’d pointed out--insurance that was better than “have your ex-medic buddy stitch you up with liquor and things from the cabinet” when he did crazy shit. She was sure his crazy shit days weren’t behind him. He’d signed up for this job, hadn’t he?

 

***

“Where are you going?” Natasha said to Steve, as they met in a hallway at headquarters.

“I want to see Frank Castle’s combat training workshop in action,” Steve admitted sheepishly. “I read all his files last night, those newspaper articles.”

“Did you see the CIA ones?” Natasha asked.

“No,” Steve said. “Nutshell?”

“A black ops mercenary team led by tried to kill him and another member of his unit in Kentucky. In the woods. The other man, Henderson, was killed, but they took down an entire tactical unit of mercenaries between the two of them. They had help from an NSA analyst with a drone,” she said.

“Who was targeting him?” Steve asked.

“Rawlins. That’s who he exposed to get the pardon. Rawlins was running a drug trafficking operation out of Afghanistan.”

“Heroin?” Steve said, raising an eyebrow. She nodded.

“In the bodies of dead American troops,” Natasha said. Steve’s jaw worked.

 

They went into the small conference room. Frank was sitting in a chair at the front of the room, doing  his middle-distance stare. The seated agents around the table looked nervous. He turned at the sound of Natasha and Steve’s murmured greetings. “You come to supervise me, Cap?” he asked, twitching his nose.

“No,” Steve said, sitting down next to Nat. “I’m here to learn.”

“Captain America is here to learn from me?” Frank said wryly. “Huh. What do you want to know?”

“How does an unenhanced man take on multiple assailants and win?” Steve said.

“You just have to want to kill the other guy more than he wants to kill you,” Frank said. “Ain’t like it’s difficult. Any more questions?” He looked around the room. Nobody spoke. “If there aren’t any questions, I’m just gonna go,” he said. Frank made to stand up, like he was leaving.

“How far away were you when you shot the last surviving man in that cartel in Juarez?” Natasha asked quietly. Some of the tech guys looked a little queasy. Steve understood; the photos in Frank’s file were horrifying.

“I was in El Paso,” Frank said.

“Across the border?” one of the agents said.

“It’s not that far,” Frank said. ‘Half a mile, one mile at most. You just gotta have the right weather conditions, know your MOA.”

“MOA?” Cameron Klein said.

“Minute of angle. It’s the measurement unit for bullet inaccuracies and movement over 100 yards, kid,” Frank said. “One inch for every 100 yards. Accuracy’s harder the farther away you are at a consistent rate, unless you’ve got wind fucking with you. Gravity’s consistent. But it was a clear night in Juarez.”

“And obviously in El Paso,” someone said at the back of the room.

“Oh, look we got a jokester,” Frank said. “You gonna be the class clown?” he asked the agent. Everyone looked nervous again. Frank laughed. “That’s fine, I’ve got a sense of humor. But we really should talk about ways to kill somebody when you’re out of bullets. A pencil--”

 

As they stood to leave the classroom, Cameron Klein looked at Heather Sullivan. “Well, that was fucking terrifying,” he whispered.

“And we have to come back,” Heather said. They’d just reached the door when someone spoke again.

“Hey, you,” Frank called. “Curly Sue, get over here.”

“Me?” Cameron said.

“Yeah, you. I have a question for you.”

“Okay,” Cameron said nervously.  He walked over to where Frank was sitting. He had a tablet in his hand. He prodded the screen. “That’s you, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Cameron said. Frozen on the device was a surveillance image of Brock Rumlow holding a gun to his head. It was weird to see it when Cameron still had such visceral memories of _feeling_ it: the cold press of the gun against his skull, the rolling stink of an angry, yet collected Rumlow, his own sweat from fear. He could remember the way he’d had trouble getting the words out when he refused to launch the helicarriers.

“You were fine then,” Frank said.

“What?” Heather said.

“Rumlow doesn’t even have his finger on the trigger,” Frank said. “He’s got consistent trigger discipline. He doesn’t really want to shoot you.”

“Oh,” Cameron said.

“Not until this moment,” Frank said, fast-forwarding. “That’s when he puts his finger on the trigger. You didn’t do what he asked you to, then he moved. Why’d you do that, Curly Sue?”

“What?” Cameron said.

“You refused to launch those carriers,” Frank said.

“It was the right thing to do,” Cameron said.  From his chair, Steve spoke up.

“I met Cameron’s grandfather when he held off an entire squad of Nazis to save an injured fellow soldier during the war,” he told Frank. “Battle of the Bulge.”

“That so?” Frank said. Cameron swallowed and nodded. “This wasn’t very smart,” Frank told him, tapping the screen, “if it had been me, you’d be dead already. I wouldn’t have given you the minute he gave you. Next time, you do what you’re told to survive--”

“Not if seven-hundred thousand people would die,” Cameron said, his nervousness overcome by a vein of indignation. “My life isn’t worth--” He stopped. Frank was grinning at him.

“You’re a good kid, aren’t you? Too good for the likes of this place,” he told Cameron. “Find a better job, maybe go feed orphans or the homeless.” He patted Cameron on the arm and Cameron managed to suppress most of his flinch. “See you next week, Curly Sue.”

 

Cameron and Heather practically bolted out of the room.

 

“Frank,” Steve said, shaking his head. “There’s no need to prove you’re more terrifying than Rumlow.”

“Prove?” Frank scoffed. He looked at Natasha. “Is he serious?” She nodded. “Isn’t that why I’m here? Because I am more terrifying than him?” Frank asked, chuckling and drinking his coffee. Natasha looked thoughtful.

“That is a logical position to take,” she admitted. “Rumlow has not, to my knowledge, ever strung one alive man on a meathook, much less a dozen.”

“Eh, they were handy,” Frank said. “I’ll have to mention that story in class next week. Where do you keep the guns around here?” he asked.

“I’ll show you,” Natasha told Frank.

“You coming, Cap?” Frank asked.

“Uh, no, I’m getting some lunch,” Steve said. He cursed his eidetic memory and those photos in Frank’s file a little.

 

***

Steve ran into Thor in the cafeteria. “My Jane is most upset,” Thor said in a quiet voice, as he heaped tater tots onto a tray. The cafeteria worker beamed at him.

“I’m not entirely happy, either,” Steve said, sighing. This was understatement. Steve was anxious, worried, and regretful. “I should have been the goat.”

“The goat?” Thor said.

“Fury really was trying to use me. But Darcy didn’t want Buck getting upset and at the time I agreed with her. In hindsight, I could have explained it all to Buck, this seems more dangerous to her--” He looked up. Jane and Darcy had entered the cafeteria. “There they are,” Steve said. He waved them over. “I just got out of Frank’s, uh, workshop?” he said, once they were near.

“Did you have fun?” Darcy asked.

“It was interesting,” Steve admitted. Jane was looking vexed.

“Where is he?” Darcy said.

“Weapons storage with Nat,” Steve said.

“Oh, I’ll go find him,” Darcy said. The three of them watched as she trotted off. She was wearing polka dots.

 

“It’s happening _again_ and I still can’t do anything about it,” Jane grumbled. Thor shook his head.

“Maybe it will turn out for the best, my love?” the Asgardian offered. Jane looked ready to snarl at him.

“Don’t try to placate me right now, I’m--I’m so upset,” she said, grabbing her own cafeteria tray. “I just really, really wanted her to end up with Ian,” she said to Steve in frustration. Her voice had a slight wail. Thor sighed.

“Your old assistant in London?” Steve said.

“A good man,” Thor said. “He cared for her deeply, but she found him too dull.”

“He’d never even touched a gun,” Jane said, taking another scoop of vegetables. “Never! But oh no, she can’t settle down with a nice _sane_ person, just these batshit murdery guys with knives in their shoes. And they’re all Sicilians! Why are they all Sicilians? Is it the volcano? Do you realize Castle’s grandparents and Rumlow’s grandparents were from the same region before they emigrated to New York?”

“Really?” Steve said.

“Their families are both from the area around Trapani,” Jane said. “It’s in their SHIELD files.”

“It’s a most interesting coincidence,” Thor mused, “given the nature of Midgardian immigration and movement patterns.”

“Maybe you could take her to Sicily,” Steve said, “find a nice fella that makes gelato or something, just looks like he has knives in his boots?”

“My luck, he’d turn out to be a Gambino enforcer on the run or something,” Jane said. “I’m so afraid she going to get attached to him and be devastated when Castle bails.” She sighed.

“I could think of worse things,” Steve said, as they chose a table.

“Worse?” Jane said, raising both eyebrows. Thor stopped the movement of his fork to his mouth.

“What if this one doesn’t?” he said. “Doesn’t leave?”

“Steve,” Jane said. “Steve. Why do you give me new horrifying things to worry about?”

“Sorry,” Steve said, looking chagrined.

“It will be all right, my love,” Thor said.

“Promise me you’ll never, ever introduce her to Wade Wilson, Steve,” Jane said.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said. “Is he Italian, too?”

“I do not believe he is,” Thor said. “I have heard he is from a most pleasant Midgardian place.”

“Yeah?” Steve said.

“You call it Canada? A friendly people, is it not?” Thor said. “Most polite to me when I accidentally landed there with Mjolnir once.”

 

***

Darcy found Frank at the range with Natasha. “This is a nice gunsight--” he was saying.

“It’s good for walls up to a depth of twenty inches,” Darcy said. The gunsight was a SHIELD weapon. You could use it to spot bodies through walls. “There’s some interference with concrete block walls, but most walls are fine.”

“How do you know that?” Frank said, looking at her in surprise.

“Because Rumlow taught her all about his favorite weapons,” Natasha supplied.

“He’s fond of SIG-Sauers and used to carry a custom P226. I don’t know if that’s in the file. He’ll use any weapon he can find, though. Grenades, small-grade rockets....” Darcy said.

“You were living in that goddamned apartment, knowing this shit, with just one gun?” Frank said. He’d seen her handgun. Natasha laughed.

“Get her to show you the box,” she told Frank.

***

“You cook too much,” Frank said that night, when she was studying her pantry. “I don’t need to be waited on hand and foot. I’m not Brock Rumlow,” he teased. At least, Darcy thought he was teasing her.

“He didn’t--I like cooking,” Darcy insisted.

“Order something like a typical lazy person, your Martha Stewart routine is unnatural and disturbing,” Frank said. “Nobody actually likes to cook that much.”

“Sure, fine,” Darcy said. They had Chinese and then she’d showed him the weapons arsenal under her floorboard. She had a gun safe hidden in her walk-in. “This is it,” she said, entering the code. “Numerical code spells out ALPHA on the keypad: 2-5-7-4-2. He was cute like that,” she said dryly.

“Uh-huh,” Frank said. When she swung the door open, he swore. “How do you hold the weight?” he asked, looking startled. There were a lot of guns.

“I had Clint reinforce the space for me. There are steel beams underneath, it won’t fall on Mrs. Gabor downstairs, I promise,” she explained. “Do you want to see all of them or are you good? He chose them for me, but he had...particular tastes, so?”

“It might give me insight,” Frank finished, nodding. “Anything you can remember.”

“All right,” Darcy said. “I’ll bite the bullet.” Frank chuckled. “The SIG-Sauer P226. Mine matches his. Custom grip. He thought this grip was better than the standard. His favorite handgun. She’s called Jolene.”

“He named his gun?” Frank asked.

“No, I did. That was my marital contribution, I name things. Jolene, Lucille, and Ruby, along with Doris and Francine,” she said, gesturing to each gun model. “These are multiples. There are only about six different types of guns in here, but he wanted to have plenty of what he liked….”

“Uh-huh,” Frank told her. Darcy walked him through the various handguns and the tactical rifles. It was actually not the strangest date she’d been on; Rumlow had taken her along on a surveillance mission in Rio de Janeiro once. He’d liked Brazil. Showing Frank her collection of Glocks or Colt M4 and Steyr rifles from Rumlow seemed almost normal now. "I coulda used these when the Irish showed up," he said, once they were done surveying the arsenal.

"Oh, like you gave me time to explain, Mr. I'm-So-Patient. I would have gotten them if the firefight had lasted more than sixty seconds or Dog had been in trouble," she said. He chuckled.

"Glad you've got your priorities straight," he said. He shook his head. "Let's have more kung pao, Lewis. You still hungry? I'm hungry."

"I have stuff to make brownies," she suggested.

"Dear God," he muttered.

"It's from a box!" she said.   
  


***

"Lewis?" he called to her that night, as they both lay awake in the dark. He was on her couch again.

"Yeah?" Darcy said.

“I think we should, uh, fool around a little,” Frank said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My Frank is a little more crass than canonical Frank, I think? But he was a Marine so for sure, he's heard some dirty jokes in his day.


	4. Serial Killer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and support. Y'all are awesome!

“Now?” Darcy said.

“Yeah, now,” he said. She heard him shift and the jingle of Dog’s collar.

“Do you really want to do that?” she said, unsure of him and his emotional state. She had been waiting for him to make the call on physical contact--everything from kissing to sex. She wasn’t going to push Frank Castle for intimacy.

“You gettin’ cold feet?” he asked, his voice closer.

“No, it’s you I’m worried about,” she told him. ”Are you sure you’re okay with that?” She heard him make a derisive sound.

“Yeah, I’m a grown-up, I can handle fooling around with you,” he said, appearing in her bedroom doorway in his boxers. His voice was low and gravelly. Darcy nodded. She gestured for him to come in and he walked towards her bed and sat on the edge. The light from her salt lamps made him seem tan, almost-relaxed looking. Almost.

“You can get in,” she said. “It’s a roomy bed.”

“Uh-huh,” he said, sliding under the covers. They lay there for a few minutes, then he turned to face her. Their faces were close together. He ran a thumb along the bottom edge of her mouth and she shivered in response. She could feel the warmth pooling between her legs.

“What do you want me to do?” she asked.

“I have to tell you?” he snarked.

“Shut up, you know what I mean, I want you to be comfortable,” she said. Since they were both on suppressants, some things were off the table. They’d have to go off suppressants to make the physical mechanics of bonding work. But Darcy didn’t want to push him into emotional crisis. She thought knotting with somebody other than his wife might put him there. She’d already begun wondering if he could fake-bond her without it. Maybe someone at SHIELD could design something, like those photostatic veils to mimic a bond scar, she fretted, thinking of his fragile st--

 

Frank kissed her first.

 

It was a strangely hungry motion, a little too rough, too intense. His nose bumped hers and when he abruptly shifted his weight over her body, she realized how strong and muscular and just damn heavy he was. Under his hot weight, Darcy felt herself start to melt a little. His kisses grew wetter and slower as he sucked at her top lip and settled himself slowly on top of her. She moaned a little, totally without meaning to do it.

“Frank,” Darcy whispered, wanting to make sure he was okay.

“Don’t get the wrong idea,” he said.

“Huh?” she said.

“I still love my wife. This isn’t some bullshit romance novel where I fall in love with you and you heal my broken heart and we live happily ever. I’m agreeing to protect you and fuck you,” he said. “We’re gonna solve your ex-husband problem and then go our separate ways.”

“Uh-huh,” she said. That sounded fine to her.

“Can you handle that?” he said intensely.

“I can handle a lot more than you think,” she said. He chuckled.

“Tough talk from the little woman,” he said.

“So?” she said, mimicking his chin tuck. He grinned at her. “I tased Thor, I survived Dark Elf attack, and I was married to him, remember?” she said.

“Yeah,” he said, grin turning to a frown. He wrinkled his brow like he was trying to solve a puzzle and tilted head to one side. It was odd to see his typical Pete expressions without the beard. “You were married to him, weren’t you?” Frank asked, scrunching his nose and shaking his head a little. “You and that guy. Lewis and Crossbones. His arsenal and your little coffee socks…”

“Stop mocking my sockwear, Frank. I’m a fun person. And according to you, he chose me for--for whatever reason,” Darcy said, swallowing.

“Why do you think that was?” Frank asked, sounding genuinely curious.

“I have no idea,” Darcy admitted. “It’s a freaking unsolvable mystery, Robert Stack.” Frank laughed at her. She would have been there during the fall of the Triskelion, too, except that Brock had--probably not so coincidentally--booked her a spa visit with Jane that was the same day as the launch of Project Insight. That had always baffled Darcy; if he’d intended to abandon her all along, why not let her get shot with the rest of the admins and assistants and normals when they took over the building? In her darkest moments, she kinda wished he had. She’d finally decided it was probably Jane’s valuable brains Brock was protecting. She could see Alexander Pierce getting all grabby hands with her portal work. She had been Brock’s Useful Idiot, probably.

They were kissing when Frank spoke again. “Present for me?” he said in a growl. “I just want to see you, touch you, get ready,” he said. It was a weird request. But Frank was into this, she realized, surprised. His eyes were dark with lust. She nodded. They both got out of bed. She was acutely conscious of his gaze as she undressed and crawled back onto the bed, facing away from him. Then she waited. Darcy felt a little tremor in her body at the familiarity of the position and the unfamiliarity of him. His footsteps were very quiet. The first thing she felt was his palm, against the side of her hip. He trailed a hand down the outside of her thigh, towards her knee, then turned his wrist, pressing the tips of his fingers up the backs of her thigh. They were warm fingers. Calloused, but warm. Frank raked a hand over her clit, then slid one finger inside her and a second. Darcy rocked back into his hand, moaning a little. “You liked it,” he said wryly.

“I like this,” Darcy said, wanting to squeeze her legs together, get more friction.

“No, no,” Frank whispered, kissing her back. “You like being fucked by crazy Alphas, don’t you? I thought you were this sweet little thing, but I was misled.” He laughed. “Your boss wanted to get her boyfriend to hit me with the hammer, stage an intervention the other night. Foster keeps looking ready to kill me.”

“Uh-huh,” Darcy admitted in a half-moan. “She hated my husband.”

“Which tells me something,” he said, flexing his hand.

“What?” she murmured.

“You’ve got a mercenary’s arsenal hidden in your closet and you actually like your vitamin K spliced with Sicilian insanity. You’ve got _a problem._ ”

“Shut up, Fr--oh God, don’t stop,” she moaned, as he removed his fingers. He pulled her closer into his body and nibbled playfully at her shoulders. She sucked in a breath, surprised. He wasn’t hesitating. The bruises would be read as a sign of pre-heat courting play, she knew. Sort of like pre-bonds with a mate. Promise bites, some people called them. A cute name for hickeys, really. He nipped a little more roughly. “Ouch, asshole,” she scolded.

“Lewis, I’m taking you to breakfast tomorrow and you need to look like you’ve got a new Daddy for the SHIELD agents with the cameras and anybody at work who gossips with someone who gossips with him, wherever he is. Fury’s got us all set. We’re taking a long weekend to go off suppressants as soon as you’re ready.”

“Yeah, okay,” Darcy said. She and Fury had discussed all that, but she had been worried about rushing Frank. “How long do we ha--hhhhmmm, oh God.” He was touching her in a sensitive place, rolling his fingers back in forth.

“However long you want or until Fury pitches a fit, which is probably two, three days, tops,” he said wryly. Darcy laughed. He gave her a firm nip, tantalizingly near where Brock had left his own bond scar, then sucked gently. She groaned as he eased her back down on the bed. “Roll over,” he said. “Or I shaved for nothing this morning.”  He pushed her thighs apart and buried his face between her legs. Soon she was rocking in response to his tongue. “Crazy Omega,” he told her, smirking and licking his mouth. She swung her knee at him, but he dodged it and then held her down and did things to her clit with his mouth and tongue that made her rock and squirm.

“Soon,” she said. “It should be soon.”

“Yeah,” Frank said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Because of terrorism. Not because you’re hard up or something.” He crawled up the bed and started kissing her neck, pausing at her faded bond scar from Brock. He tilted his head and stared. “How black and blue did Crossbones leave you while you were courting?” Frank asked.

“You could see the bruises from Asgard,” Darcy snarked.

“How ‘bout here?” Frank said thoughtfully. He’d chosen a spot higher up her neck. More visible. “Good spot?” he said. She nodded, but Frank was still staring. He chuckled. “No.”

“Huh?” Darcy said. She thought he might be experiencing regret.

“If I go right where he was, will that hit a nerve with the old man?” he said.

“Maybe,” she said, “who knows?”

“It will,” he said. He sunk his teeth in lightly and she sighed. It wasn’t like the intensity of a full bond, but it was….relaxing? Her muscles were soft in Frank’s hands as he palmed at her, doing a strangely intense inventory of her curves and shape. “Are you memorizing me? Did you want to take a picture?” she asked, as his eyes raked over her. He laughed in that wry, slightly tired way.

“This is called discovering you,” he said.

“Do I get to discover you?” she asked, slipping her hands down into his boxers. He was firm under her fingers.

“Yeah,” he said, “you do.” She smiled wickedly. “Jesus Christ, Lewis. Oh God,” he said, groaning, when she began to move her hands.

 

***

“You want coffee, Shortstack?” Frank asked, as Darcy stirred awake. They were entwined together. Frank was warm. That vanilla-tobacco scent had flooded her nostrils while she slept and now she felt all boneless and floaty. Darcy nuzzled him, gripping his neck.

“Uh-huh,” she said, but she whined a little as he detached himself. Frank laughed.

“You’re easy to please,” he said. "We've barely fooled around."

“It’s the secret to my success, being amenable to persuasion,” Darcy said, as he brought her back a cup. “Come back to bed.”

“Nope,” he said. “We’ve got a meeting with some SHIELD cameras.”

“Ughhhhhhhh,” Darcy said. “I don’t want to put on pants.” Frank snorted.

“Get up, lazy,” he said. “This is work time, not play time.” The photos were going to look like part of an agency background check on her relationships, as the assistant to Jane Foster. SHIELD was making a fake surveillance file for her new Alpha boyfriend, full-time construction worker Pete Castiglione. It was one of the few times that one of Fury’s complicated schemes seemed smart: they were going to circulate the Pete file onto networks that Rumlow probably had bugged or at least casually monitored. It was like Frank said, if he didn’t know he was dealing with Frank Castle, Brock might be taken by surprise.

They went to breakfast at a diner for their staged photos. Frank wore a baseball cap and sunglasses but kept his arm around her as they walked, stopping to give some money to a homeless guy. The weirdest part was the big enthusiastic smile he kept doing as he looked at her or leaned down to kiss her. It was totally abnormal for him. He’d been careful to get on the side of her that was less marked so that whoever was supposed to be photographing them could get a clear shot of the bruises on her neck. There was more than one bruise now. They’d gotten carried away.

“What?” she said, when she caught him giving her a funny look as they ate.

“I’m thinking,” he said.

“Okay,” she said.

“If I’m more affectionate with you will it make things faster?” he asked. He meant her heat cycle. Being in a relationship--proximity, touching, fooling around--sometimes made them come on faster when you went off suppressants. A faster cycle meant they’d be bonded sooner with less discomfort for her.

“Probably, yeah,” she said. “I’ve never timed it, but yeah. Last time it was a day or two.” A few days was typical, especially if you were cycling by choice and happy about it. She bit into her toast.

“You want more bacon?” he asked. He gestured to the waitress. “Ma’am, can I get some more bacon over here and regular coffee? Thanks.” Frank, Darcy had realized, was oddly polite for the Punisher. Especially to women and people in the service industry.

“Do you know your time or something?” she asked, after their coffee had been refilled. For most Alphas dropping suppressants or--this was the scenario SHIELD worried about--being in the field without them, the window began at seventy-two hours after they missed a dose. Steve, with his serum metabolism, had to worry about going into rut after twenty-four, but his self-control was ironclad and he’d once managed to hold it off for seventy-two hours. Brock’s missed dose window had been forty-eight, but he was similarly calm in emergencies and could slow down onset of full symptoms by another four or five hours. He and Steve had once co-taught a SHIELD seminar on calming strategies for Alpha agents. Before everything.

“It’s uh, nine hours once I miss a dose,” Frank said. Darcy almost spit out her coffee.

“How is that possible?” Darcy said. He rubbed his face sheepishly.

“I was deployed too much, my military doctor said. All the stress hormones, they have to give you higher and higher suppressant dosages so you don’t frag your own team because somebody took the last cookie or you see a pretty Omega. Military-grade stuff is stronger. I had, uh, rebound hormonal rise when they tried to put me back on regular things--”

“Like Benadryl makes people have rebound allergic reactions sometimes?” Darcy asked.

“Yeah,” he said. “Sorta.” He twitched a little.

“What, Frank?” she said. That was his tell.

“It, uh, didn’t help that I did some black ops work where we intentionally lowered our dosages to have an advantage in the field,” he said.

“How did you not kill each other?” Darcy said.

“Funny thing,” he said, inhaling reflexively. “There was this guy named Rawlins who ended up walking around without a functioning eye because he put my people in danger….but I messed myself up pretty badly. It’s the reason I’m good at what I do, Darcy.”

“Yeah,” she said.

“You scared?” he asked. “I don’t tell people that--”

“Why would you hurt me, aren’t I one of your people now?” she said.

“Didn’t mean you. What about what I do to _him?_ You sure you’re ready to be a widow, if comes to that?” Frank asked.

“Why does it always come to that with you, Frank?” she asked quietly.

“Legal system’s slow and inefficient?” he suggested wryly. But then he turned serious on a dime, leaning towards her. “I’m all messed up inside. It’s in my blood, my body. People think I want this, I don’t want this, but nobody else can do it. You understand? Nobody. And you gotta be ready. Are you ready?” His gaze was intense.

“He might not show up at all,” she said, eating another slice of bacon. Frank scoffed.

“Don’t bullshit me, Darcy,” he said. “He’s your husband.”

“It’s been over eleven months, Frank. No contact. No emails, no notes, no birthday gifts or cryptic packages, no acknowledgement of our anniversary,” Darcy said. “What if you’re doing this for nothing? Is that okay?”

“I’m not,” he said flatly. He pulled out his cell phone. “I’m going to call Fury, get the safe rooms ready so we can be alone, I don’t think your apartment is secure if Rumlow’s mother knows--”   

Darcy stared a little as he made arrangements on the phone. _Frank was ready to bond? Really?_

“Fury’s got rooms at headquarters available in forty eight hours. You’ve got your birth control in order, right?” he asked, as soon as he’d hung up. Darcy nodded. She knew about SHIELD’s internal, secure rooms. They were euphemistically called “relaxation rooms” for agents who’d gone into heat cycles, been sex pollened, or whatever bizarre sex-alien thing the Chitauri or other weirdos had cooked up. Last time, it had been an alien goo that made you sex-mad. Clint had gotten a tiny drop on his arm and then told the dirtiest jokes Darcy had ever heard.

“Yeah, I have a pack of the pills,” she told him. There was a contraceptive you took directly afterwards to prevent pregnancy that was stronger than standard Beta ones.

“You think Barton or Thor would watch the dog for a few days?” he asked.

“Thor volunteered already,” Darcy said.

“We can pack go-bags. I want you somewhere secure when those pictures get to Rumlow,” Frank said.

“Okay,” Darce said. She could skip her evening’s suppressant dose as soon as the rooms were available. He looked at her and sighed. His expression had gone a little tense. “What?” she said gently.

“My Alpha instincts, they’re haywire. I’m like--a--a circuit with overload or some shit. I mean, I can feel it, I can feel the turn when shit goes down. It’s like somebody else is there. I didn’t used to be like this. I was a normal Alpha once. I met Maria because I was playing fucking guitar in the park and singing like a moron,” he said, shaking his head. “I changed.” She nodded. They were both silent for a moment. “I’m broken,” he said, looking at his hands.

“You saved Dog,” she pointed out.

“Your score card don’t tally, Shortstack.”

“I was never good at math,” she told him. He laughed. They made sure to kiss outside on the sidewalk and again at headquarters. It wasn’t difficult. If Frank was okay, Darcy realized, she was game.

 

***

He was affectionate and touchy-feely all day, rubbing her neck, dragging her into his lap, and doing a great impression of a territorial, deeply attached Alpha whenever anyone looked at them funny. She knew he wasn’t seriously homicidal because he laughed under his breath as the various SHIELD agents fled in response to his flat death-glare in the break room. “This is too much fun, Shortstack,” he told her.

“You’re enjoying yourself?” she said.

“Middle management over there bolted so fast, I think he left his coffee,” Frank said, chuckling.

 

After work, they went out to dinner in Alexandria and took Dog, looking for all the world like a loving couple (there were SHIELD agents with cameras following them). Frank had a Greek restaurant he liked where Dog could eat on the patio, so Darcy found herself eating a plate of chicken kabobs and fries in the humidity. “They’re gone,” Frank said suddenly. He was covertly looking around under the brim of his cap.

“Nope, there’s still a guy in the Walgreens parking lot,” Darcy told him, patting Dog.

“Look at you, Shortstack, showing me up. He’s in his SUV now,” Frank said. “You’re not half-bad, you know that? You take this seriously.”

“I had to--Jane’s been almost-kidnapped three different times. Twice in Norway.”

“Gotta watch them Norwegians,” he said. “What is it she can do that’s so valuable, besides the big blonde?” Darcy arched an eyebrow at him. “Oh, did I say something offensive?” Frank asked.

“Oh, only a little thing called moving stuff through time and space. She has a PhD in astrophysics, Frank. She’s a genius. I mean, we’ve just tested her latest project with inanimate things and plants so far, but last week she portaled my Fruit Loops to the Omaha field office,” Darcy said. She pulled out her phone and flipped her photo app on. “See? Agent Gibbons in Nebraska said they tasted fine.” The agent on screen was smiling and holding up a spoon.

“She replace your Fruit Loops?” Frank asked.

“Always,” Darcy said. He grinned. She was having a weirdly good time with Frank, even though he told her stories about self-treating his own injuries that couldn’t possibly be true.”No, no,” she said, “you did not patch a dislocated shoulder with duct tape, Frank!”

“It was over my clothes, just for support,” he said. “Sometimes you gotta play through the pain--what’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing,” Darcy said. She’d caught her reflection in the restaurant’s window.

“Stop lying,” Frank said roughly. He’d said it like an order.

“Did you just Alpha voice me?” Darcy said.

“You’ll know when I do that. Tell me what’s wrong,” he said firmly. She sighed.

“I forgot I was wearing this,” Darcy said, touching the gold and diamond necklace at her throat. The pendant was a gold sphere with an X-shaped spray of diamonds.  “Gift from Brock, very expensive, David Yurman, blah blah blah.”

“It a family heirloom you want to give back to his mom?” Frank said.

“Nope, we bought it together,” Darcy said. “It’s new.”

“Uh-huh,” Frank said.

 

He took her and Dog for a walk along the Old Town Waterfront. “Here we are,” Frank said. “I called the camera guys back.”

“What?” Darcy said.

“This is the spot,” Frank said. It was very quaint and cute. Dog sniffed around.

“The spot for what--I’m not a public sex girl, Frank,” she said. He laughed.

“No, weirdo. This is where you toss your necklace from the asshole, let go of that bad karma or whatever the fuck you’d call it,” Frank said, laughing.

“Oh,” Darcy said. “That’s not a bad idea, actually.”

“Why are you so obsessed with sex? You got a fixation with me or something?” he said teasingly, tucking her head under his chin for a second.

“Shut up and help me get this off, Frank,” she said, pulling her hair aside. He unhooked her necklace and passed it to her. “Thanks.”

“I used to do that for Maria,” he said, suddenly quieter. “She was always losing the charm thing on this necklace I got her for our seventh when she took it off by herself at night. She had trouble with clasps. She'd lose one end and the charm would go flying off. We would both be crawling around on the floor, looking for it--” Frank's voice broke. He lapsed into silence.

“What kind of charm was it?” she asked softly.

“Heart,” he said. He snorted. “Original, right? I just wanted her to know I wasn’t getting that seven year itch bullshit,” he said. They were quiet for a minute. Darcy thumbed at the chain in her palm. It the dark, the diamonds sparkled. It had been very expensive.

“I’m sorry, Frank. Really sorry,” she said.

“Yeah,” he said. “I believe you.”

“This is probably a stupid thing to say--” She paused, looking out over the river.

“Say it,” he said, tightening his grip around her torso.

“At least you know it was real. She would be with you, if she could, Frank. You had something real and fine and you’ll always have that. Nothing can take that away from you,” Darcy said, blinking. She could hear the water moving against the dock pillars beneath them, the sound of Dog’s toenails as he explored along the edge of the railing as far as his leash would go.

“Fine, huh? I thought that was what women said when they were mad at you?” he said. His voice was a low rumble.

“Fine as in high-quality. Special,” she told him,

“Yeah,” he said. “It was.” Darcy nodded. “I coulda taken a hit on quality to have more quantity, though.” He leaned against the top of her head gently.

“I never understood this,” she said, meaning her necklace. “The symbolism, I mean. At least a heart is clear. This--he picked it out, I don’t know why. I feel like I didn’t know him at all, so everything’s this puzzle that I kept looking for some meaning in. What did he see in it?”

“It looks like a damn planet,” Frank said. “Goldfinger’s home planet.” She laughed.

“It does! It’s weird. I’m going to toss it,” she told him.

“You sure?” he asked.

“Yep.” She held the chain up and swung it. They both paused for a beat or two, looking at the pendant as it moved like a metronome, back and forth. “Maybe I was the ball and chain?” she said. Frank chuckled.

“The old ball and chain,” he said. “You’re really sure?” he repeated.

“I’m sure. I have to do this stuff, Frank.”

“You’re just taking out the trash, you know that,” he said. She pulled her hand back.

“Taking out the trash,” she repeated.

“Here we go,” Frank said. “Wind it up, Shortstack. Let it fly.” Darcy pitched the necklace into the water. She heard it land with a splash. “Woo-hoo!” Frank said. “Yes! You see that? You did it!” He was laughing. She turned to him, then wrapped her arms around his neck in a soft hug.

“Thanks,” she told him. Frank was still for a moment, then he looked at her. He leaned down and smashed his mouth against hers. It occurred to Darcy--once Frank had boosted her legs around his waist and was greedily pressing against her--that the photos would be really upsetting, if her husband still had the ability to be upset.

 

On the way back to the car, feeling breathless and a little giddy, Darcy thought, _I can’t believe I did that._ Frank stopped in front of a window. “Hold on,” he told her. It was one of those touristy gift shops.

“They’re open?” Darcy said. It was unusual for somewhere like that to be open after five or six.

“Yeah. Coincidence is the mother of invention,” Frank said, opening the door. “Ma’am,” he called politely, “I’ve got a dog with me, but I’d like to buy something out of your window, if I can?”

“What are you doing?” Darcy asked him, as the woman behind the register came over.

“Trying to find something that will offend Rumlow’s delicate sensibilities or some bullshit,” Frank said.

“How can I help you?” the lady asked.

“We were looking at the necklaces in your window,” he told the woman. It was a tray of necklaces. They were mini charms on fine chains, each backed with a card that explained the symbolism: anchors, crosses, butterflies, hearts, sand dollars. “What one do you like, Shortstack?” Frank said, looking at Darcy.

“I dunno,” she said.

“You don’t know?” Frank said. “I’ll pick one out, then. Get the little star for us, please. The silver one,” he said.

“Oh, those are actually wish necklaces. The backing card are recycled,” the woman said. Darcy was holding Dog’s leash with her other hand. He wagged his tail at the woman and she looked a little doubtful.

“Isn’t that nice? It’s good for the environment,” Frank said. “You can pet the dog, he’s friendly. It’s what with tax?” He reached for his wallet.

“Wait, you shouldn’t spend money--” Darcy began, but he waved her off and handed the woman--petting Dog happily--twenty-five dollars.

“Don’t worry about a bag, we’ll just put it on right here,” he told her. She brought him his change and the necklace.

“Turn around Shortstack,” he said, as he hung the tiny star around her neck.

“Oh my God,” Darcy said, as they walked away. “You’re baiting him, aren’t you?”

“Yeah,” Frank said, smirking. “He’s gonna lose his mind when he sees you tossing that fancy-ass ugly necklace into a damn river and putting on a twenty-buck one from Pete the construction guy.” He laughed.

"I have a bad feeling about this," she said.

 

They ended up sprawled on her couch, pawing at each other. Frank groaned. “What?” Darcy said.

“I want more,” he said in a irritable, growly voice. “More.”  She scoffed, trying to hide her grin. In this mood, he smelled  _amazing._ She wanted to actually melt into him, like ice cream in the sunshine. He was her own personal waffle cone or something.

“Uh-huh,” she said.

“What?” he said.

“You’ll just end up in a diabetic coma,” she told him flirtatiously.

“My own words, coming back to haunt me,” he said. She disentangled herself and left him on the couch.

“Goodnight, Frank, I'm going to bed,” she said. He frowned up at her, looking particularly flat-nosed.

“Can Dog sleep with you?” he asked.

“Yeah,” she called from the bedroom.

“What about me?” he said. She could hear him shifting a little.

“You’ve got five seconds before Dog steals your pillow,” Darcy said. "Get in here, Marine."

 

***

 

“Who is going to tell him?” Smith asked Rollins. They’d received an alert on _Darcy Lewis_. There were certain keywords and phrases that Jack Rollins had set up an electronic bug to monitor. He’d set up backdoors and firewall holes as a SHIELD agent. He’d always been so monosyllabic, no one at SHIELD realized that Jack Rollins had studied computer science. None of the loyal agents even knew he was from Sydney. Or that Jack was the great-grandson of Leonard Rollins, a close associate of Tilly Devine, the notorious Aussie madam, bootlegger, and razor gang boss. Alexander Pierce had covered his tracks well when he went looking for the descendants of infamous criminals, but he had been particularly impressed to learn that Jack had Leonard’s skills with a straight razor.

“I’ll tell him, mate,” Jack said grimly. He carried the tablet out of the room and moved into another section of the warehouse in West Africa. The grey steel door to his boss’s quarters was shut. Jack knocked. “Brock?” he called out.

“Door’s open.”

“I’ve, uh, got news, mate,” Jack said, when he’d pushed the door in. He lingered in the doorway.

“Something wrong with the deal?” Brock said. He was facing away from Jack, his eyes glued to a blueprint.

“It’s about Darcy,” Jack said.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I didn't actually decide this this fic should be (fairly lightly) A/B/O because I wanted to set up a Rumlow vs. Castle rivalry so much as I was interested in the idea of Frank as a good Alpha/decent person with messed up protective neurochemistry. I feel like the trope adds a layer to Frank's in-canon move from an eighteen year old enlistee who has never held a gun and wants to play guitar in the park into The Punisher?
> 
> Darcy's necklace from Brock is this $$$$ thing: https://www.davidyurman.com/products/womens/dy-shops/gold/solari-pave-wrap-pendant-necklace-with-diamonds-in-18k-gold-12mm.pdp.html
> 
> The tiny star that replaces it: https://www.etsy.com/listing/384924948/silver-star-necklace-shining-star?ref=related-7&frs=1
> 
> I also couldn't resist giving Bad Jack the craziest, BEST backstory in all of 20s Australian history: that he's descended from somebody in the real-life razor gangs. There were two infamous madams/female crime bosses--Tilly Devine and Kate Leigh--whose subordinates basically engaged in street razor fights after gun legislation went through: https://www.rejectedprincesses.com/princesses/kate-leigh-and-tilly-devine


	5. Honeymoon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos!

“What about her?” Brock said. The question was calm, even casual, but Jack could see the spike in tension across Brock’s shoulders. “Well?” Brock said.

“Mate--” Jack said. He sighed _._ “She’s met somebody.” There was a long pause. Jack had expected anger. He’d expected his boss’s rage, the tearing sound of crumpled metal and crushed laminate as Brock put his fist through his desk. He’d been prepared to duck the flying debris. Instead, Brock was calm. Too calm.

“What do you have?” he asked Jack.

“A SHIELD surveillance file,” Jack said quietly, avoiding Brock’s scarred face and looking over his shoulder.

“Tell me about him.”

“He’s, uh, a thirty-eight year old construction worker named Pete Castiglione. Originally from New York, never married, no kids….”

 

Brock had slightly tuned out Jack when he saw the photos on the tablet. There was a slight buzz in his ears, like the sound of a fluorescent bulb dying. He flicked through the images, pausing at one. “Brock?” Jack said. His voice sounded nervous, anxious.  

“You can go, Jack, Brock said flatly. “Go.” Jack backed out of the room, frowning and confused. Why was Brock so calm? Those photos had horrified Jack. You could see Darcy’s courting bruises from bloody space. He knew Brock had given her that necklace, too. She’d worn it at the wedding.

 

***

Pierce had assigned Brock to Foster. “It appears that she and Thor are on a break of some sort,” Pierce had said coolly. “That gives you an opportunity, Rumlow. I’m moving your unit offices to the corridor nearest hers. But Foster is highly suspicious. Some would say paranoid.” Pierce chuckled. "You'll have to approach a relationship with her carefully."

“Sir?” Rumlow said. Foster was an Alpha, as far as he knew. He expressed that carefully.

“Oh, yes, she is, but she prefers Alpha partners. An outlier.”

“Yes, sir,” Brock said, nodding.

“I admire paranoia,” Pierce mused. “Foster is socially cleverer than one might anticipate, given that she works in a theoretical field.” That was Pierce’s way of conveying that Jane Foster would probably not be interested in dating a STRIKE commander.

“Yes, sir,” Rumlow said.  

 

Brock had greeted Foster in the hallway, as he walked with Jack and she was heading into her lab. “Good morning, doctor.”

“Bite me, jack-booted thug!” she said grumpily.

“What I’d say?’ Brock said wryly, as they passed the lab’s glass door.

“It’s not your fault, really,” a voice said behind him. Brock turned. A petite woman was standing behind them, holding a tray of coffees.

“No?” Brock said. This was Foster’s little assistant. Dark hair, glasses, full figure.

“She’s inclined to bite people before I get her caffeine IV started in the morning,” she said, gesturing to the tray like a gameshow host.

“Important job,” he said coolly. Befriend the friend, he thought.

“Truth. I’ve saved the world at least once, maybe twice,” she said.

“That so?” Jack said in his stilted fake-American. She nodded.

“But I’ve saved Jane from prison many, many times. Definitely some murder charges, a handful of attempted assaults,” she said. Great, Brock thought. This will be slow going.

“We’ll let you get to it,” Brock said, opening the door for her. _Omega, good smell,_ his brain registered, as he got a whiff of vanilla cake batter when she moved into the lab.

 

A week and several rebuffed polite, meaningless greetings to Foster later, Thor returned and the two reconciled. Noisily. All of SHIELD heard the sounds emerging from her supply closet. He ran into the assistant in the break room, reading _Us Weekly._ “Hey, SHIELD Rambo--” she said.

“Excuse me?” he said.

“Do you know where Captain Steve hits the things? Everybody but me, including readers of this magazine, has seen him hit boxing thingamajigs and I’m beginning to feel left out,” she said.

“Oh, yeah? You got FOMO?” he asked, leaning against the counter as the coffee brewed.

“Totally,” she said. “I’m Darcy, by the way. Darcy Lewis.” She offered him a handshake. Her nails were painted purple.

“Rumlow. Brock Rumlow,” he said.

“That’s your actual name?” she said. “You sound like a Bond villain.” He shrugged.

“Maybe. I’ll walk you down to the STRIKE-level gym,” he said.

“Aww, Rambo, you don’t have to be my escort,” she said.

“Actually, I do. You need my hands to get where you want to go, Darcy Lewis.” She really laughed then.

“Sure, I do.”

“Uh-huh,” he’d said. When they got to the correct floor, he put his palm into a rectangular reader and it beeped.

“Holy shih tzu, that wasn’t a cheesy pickup line?” she asked.

“Nope,” he said.

“Has someone tried to kill Cap here?” she asked.

“No.” He grinned slyly. “But they have tried to take pictures of him getting out of the shower and sell them.”

“So, I shouldn’t do that, huh?” she said, grinning.

“Nope. I’d have to detain you.”

“With the handcuffs?” she said flirtatiously.

“Possibly my taser rod,” he said. She burst out laughing.

“High-five for brass balls, my dude.” She actually high-fived him. He had more than a little curiosity about how she and Foster were friends; SHIELD files said they were like sisters.

 

Figuring that he was off the Foster assignment, Brock went back to flirting semi-casually with Sharon Carter and picking up women in bars that weekend. He had a Monday meeting with Pierce. “Rumlow, I’m taking you off Foster--” Brock nodded. He’d expected that.

“--so start with the assistant now,” Pierce said.

“Sir?” Brock frowned.

“This is actually more ideal,” Pierce mused. “She seems to be a much more approachable sort of person and she’s an Omega”--at Brock’s look, he paused, studied a sheet--”Foster’s assistant. Darcy Lewis? Twenty-seven, single, brunette, Omega. You’ve spoken to her in the hall.”

“Yes, sir,” he said coolly. He could be charming, even if it meant nothing and she wasn’t his type. Brock preferred blondes. The downside of knotting, too, would be all the proximity to her afterwards: being literally stuck to someone when all he wanted was a shower and toothpaste to get the taste of them out of his mouth.

 

He went to the lab and asked her out on a date that afternoon. “I thought you’d never ask, my dude,” she’d said.

“I had to work up my courage,” he said, as she smiled at him with that wide mouth.

“Sure,” she said. He took her for pizza as a test of how high-maintenance she was. Not at all, as it turned out. Darcy Lewis told him jokes and crazy Asgard stories. She was a good eater. An even better cook. Good in bed, too. Not uptight about waiting ‘til the third date or lacking in confidence. They dated for a few months. She’d ditched her suppressants in the first week, so he was treated to the unusual experience of knotting with a woman who’d brought him his favorite, little-indulged carbonara in bed. He gathered intel on Foster (experiments into moving Cheerios to Gainesville field office only partially successful, but Foster still wildly determined) and Lewis (funny, liked hats, very into him). He was fulfilling the parameters of his assignment, he told himself, when he took her to her favorite places (the zoo, the aquarium, museums), let her cling to him like saran wrap, and introduced her to people as his queen. Did it matter that she got along with his mother and sister and let his mother’s absurd rescue beagles climb all over her while she giggled? Of course not. He was just fortunate to be assigned to her. He couldn’t imagine that it would have been easy to convince his Ma that he was into Jane Foster with her wandering off to scribble notes on pieces of toilet paper or the backs of light bills during dinner. He should be nice to Lewis for making his job easier, he thought. She was like that, she smoothed things over, made them simple. Almost fun. He bought her an expensive necklace. He liked the diamond X-motif. _X marks the spot_ bubbled up in his mind as he hung it on her neck. _Odd._

 

She was so delighted by the gift, he bought more things: some of those scarves she liked so much, a fizzy sweet perfume in the shape of a candy wrapper that complimented her natural scent, more jewelry. Her reaction to anything he got her was pure delight. It didn’t even matter if he’d just happened to get her some new flavor of Pop Tarts that she and Jane wanted to try. They were a believable couple, he thought, in part because she made it so easy. Faking affection was normally challenging but he was capable. Especially when she showed up at events in red lipstick and clingy dresses and did her saran wrap routine, tucking herself under his arm. “Good job,” Jack said to him at one of the SHIELD parties.

“Hmm?” Brock said, eyes on Darcy across the room.

“Everyone thinks you’re mad about her. Breaking Peterson’s wrist tonight was genius,” Jack said.

“He tried to grope her ass when he thought I wasn’t looking, he got what he deserved,” Brock said.

“Uh-huh,” Jack said wryly. But that rare flash of temper had unforeseen consequences.

 

After he heard about Peterson, Pierce told him that he ought to bond with her, secure his proximity to Foster’s research. Brock hadn’t ever considered bonding. He wasn’t a commitment guy. But an order from Pierce was non-negotiable. To refuse meant death. And he would be fine. He was always fine. Brock Rumlow didn’t catch feelings. Besides, Darcy Lewis was a remarkably easy-going and mate-oriented Omega. All he had to do was drop a hint and she’d made him _zeppole_ and found his favorite muscle balm from Thailand. A pleaser. Being bonded to a pleaser might be an enjoyable experience, for however long it lasted. And who knew how long that would be? Insight was nearing completion, but it had been delayed before. You had to be flexible, roll with things. He got back from the meeting with Pierce and looked at Darcy. They were practically living together at his place anyway. “What are you making?” he asked. “Smells good.”

“Those zucchini fritters you love so much, plus steak,” she said, as he crossed the kitchen and slipped his arms around her neck.

“I want to bond with you,” he said.

“Haha, very funny,” she said.

“I’m serious,” he said. “You ever thought about that?” He nuzzled her neck and realized her heart was beating faster.

“We should talk about it?” she said gently. His heart sank a little. He’d recovered by the time they were on the couch after dinner, undressing.

“Aren’t we supposed to be talking?” he said, breathing heavily.

“I can’t leave Jane,” she said breathlessly. “She’d starve without my supervision and I’d feel awful. But I really, really, really want to bond with you--” He’d pressed his mouth against hers urgently. He could feel her smiling.

“Yeah?” he said, smirking.

“I’m so happ--ooooh, hey, those were expensive,” she said, as he tore away her underwear.

“I know,” he snarked, “I bought ‘em.”

 

It wasn’t like he _felt_ anything when he was knotted inside her and sunk his teeth into her neck, the both of them moaning and writhing slightly. There was a strange shivering sensation, like cold chills, followed by a pooling feeling of warmth that made him feel pleasantly relaxed and drowsy, but that was all. He’d slumped down, towing them both onto their sides and sucking on her shoulder. “Oh, God, Brock,” she’d said, shivering. He could feel her emotions now--all the warmth and joy and affection. Affection for him. She adored him. He blinked dimly. The intensity of her feelings rocked him. It was like wading out chest high into the ocean and being hit with a strong wave.

“Let’s get married,” he said, the words out of his mouth before he realized it.

“Mmm,” she said. “What? We just bonded, we _are_ married.” She looked at him with a confused, yet sweet expression, one he recognized as her sex-glazed look.

“I want a wedding,” he’d said, pulling the sheets up over them. “A church wedding.” He squeezed her again. “Say yes, Darcy. Say yes.” He’d been a Catholic long before he’d been an Alpha. That had been his first conscious slip.

Of course, she was almost incapable of denying him things. 

Jack had stood up with him for the ceremony in the Bronx. They’d planned everything quickly--his mother was good at that kind of thing and had somehow finagled them onto the schedule at his childhood church, Our Lady of Mount Carmel and fast-tracked Darcy through her RCIA classes. Brock suspected she might have actually signed over her life insurance to the diocese as a bribe or something, even to have a small--by Italian standards--wedding on a rainy Wednesday afternoon. Normally, it took a half a year to get married in the church. She was sitting up front with his sister and Fallon, beaming at him, when Darcy started down the aisle on Thor’s arm. The force of Darcy's loving feelings had sent him rocking back on his heels, slightly dizzy.  

 

Jack had risen during the reception and made a joke about not telling their boss that Brock had cried during the ceremony. “Show me the evidence,” Brock had called back.

Jane had risen and told Darcy how much she loved her and how wonderful it was to see her so happy.

Tony Stark had stood up and made a joke about Darcy being pregnant. “I’m not pregnant!” Darcy had yelled. His mother had booed.

 

It was during their honeymoon in Mexico where he’d made the second conscious slip. They’d spent all day in the sun and swimming in the ocean. Darcy had freaked out, gotten angry, and then actually wept when he climbed a cliff, which had confused him. She was that distressed? He held her in bed that night. “Comfortable?” he asked. They were knotted together. She smelled like sunscreen and her hair was all knotty from being in the salt water.

“Yeah,” she said. “You scared me today, though.”

“I was safe,” he said. He was never safe, but the trick was not to care too much, he thought. Prep for the worst, but then keep going.

“Sure,” she said. He could feel her radiating doubt.

“I can feel you doubting me,” he teased.

“I just don’t want to lose you,” she said. Her feeling of alarm landed somewhere in his gut.

“You won’t,” he swore. “You’ll never lose me and I can protect you. Protect us, our family.”

“Protect me from what?” she asked, turning her head slightly at the intensity of his tone.

“Anything,” he said. They'd fallen asleep and then she’d woken him again, their bodies separated.

“Babe, you can take a shower now,” she said.

“Later,” he said, pulling her close.

 

It was a lie, of course. He couldn’t even protect himself when the time came. Instead, he woke in a hospital room, covered in horrific burns, and heard her voice--he’d never heard her angry before. Never felt her like this, either: rage, despair, heartbreak, bitterness, suspicion of his motives, shock, all warring in her mind.

“I want a divorce,” she was sobbing. He kept his eyes closed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As usual, the chapter title= Lana del Rey song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLxtvxfX4c8
> 
> I seriously doubt Our Lady of Mount Carmel in the Bronx would let you schedule a fast wedding, but it's a beautiful place: https://ourladymtcarmelbx.org


	6. Meet Me In The Pale Moonlight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos!

It was the photo of Darcy throwing out his necklace that finally sent Brock over the edge. Adrenaline spiked in his body and he shook. There was a heavy thudding in his ears and the edges of his vision had gone misty and red. All he could see was his wife in another Alpha’s arms. He could almost taste her skin, smell her, feel her. His fingers clamped on the edge of the desk and began to rip the surface apart. When he came back to his senses, he had destroyed his entire office: the desk was rent in two, the chairs smashed, the tablet shattered. Brock was shaking and breathing heavily.

 

The noises caught Jack’s attention. He peered into the room. “Find out anything you can about him and send in Jim,” Brock said, panting. “Cancel the Lagos deal, too. We’re going home, Jack. Now.” Brock knew exactly how long it took Darcy to go into cycle. He had a small window. He could stop this.

“Yeah,” Jack said, looking at the destroyed office. Brock was breathing in a terrifying way. He sounded like an animal. It was all Jack could do not to recoil.

 

*** 

“It’s time,” Frank said, tapping his hand on the edge of the doorway to Jane’s lab.

“What?” Darcy said, looking up from her laptop.

“Room’s ready and those photos are circulating,” he said. “Are you ready?”

“Yeah,” Darcy said. She was, more or less. There were butterflies in her stomach.  “Where’s Thor?” she said to Jane.

“Playing with Dog,” Frank supplied. “All settled. C’mon, I’m going to take you home, so you can pack.”

 

At her apartment, Darcy sat on the bed. Frank was packing his own bag down the hall. She felt overwhelmed, all of a sudden. She was really doing this. She was going to bond with someone else. All along, it had seemed like a joke, not a real possibility. Did this mean her bond with Brock would be wiped away? Like it had never happened? The thought was depressing. It had happened, her mind insisted. It was real. But had it been? That had tortured her in the months since Triskelion. She’d seen the HYDRA files that indicated Pierce had wanted someone to get close to Jane. But Darcy had felt love from Brock almost from the beginning. Even before they’d bonded, he had a way of looking at her, as if he was on the verge of confessing something intense. When had that started, she wondered. _Oh._ The first time they’d knotted. Afterwards. They’d spent a long weekend at his place. She’d made him pasta. “I never eat this stuff,” he’d told her, when she’d brought it to him in bed.

“But you said it was your favorite?” Darcy had wondered aloud.

“I don’t get to have my favorite things--not often, at least.”

“Well, that’s depressing,” she’d joked, “I’m going to have to work on that.” That had been when she started doing small things for him: cooking, renting movies he mentioned seeing as a kid, finding him these good socks that kept your feet warm and dry in all weather conditions, buying him books to read during mission travel. It wasn’t anything big _per se_ , she did the same sort of things for Thor, who had a favorite Pop Tart flavor, and Jane, who liked to do her notes in certain notebooks and liked office supplies. But she did a little things a lot. He had seemed to bloom under her care. Darcy had filled his sterile apartment with personal things. Made sure he had blankets on the back of the couch and food in the fridge. She’d given him massages and instituted a rule that they had to cuddle for five minutes a day when they were together. She’d read a study that touch promoted intimacy and relaxation. And Brock had needed that. He was all knots and tension. He’d seemed to enjoy it--even before they bonded,  he would seek her out at work.

“I need my five minutes, baby,” he’d would say. On tough workdays, he’d do it more than once and she’d hug him in the supply closet, listening to his breathing relax and his shoulders open up. He’d always kept his work stuff on lockdown--Darcy didn’t have clearance--but she could tell when he had tough days. After they’d bonded, she felt his love immediately. It had a frightening intensity: he didn’t just love her, he loved her and was scared he would lose it. There was a feeling of fragility threaded in all his passion, as if she was made of glass and liable to to break. He was terrified of it, actually. And then there had been that sudden request for a wedding, as if his feelings of passion and protectiveness weren’t enough. He’d cried during the ceremony and then practically dragged her onto Tony’s plane, happiness and adoration rolling off him in waves. He had almost been high. She could feel it. That energy had sent him climbing cliffs and then keeping her in bed for several days.

 

Darcy sighed. What was he feeling now, she wondered? She shook off the thought. She couldn’t keep loving him. “Hey,” Frank said, “you okay?” He was standing in her bedroom doorway.

“Yeah,” Darcy said, standing up. Then she burst into tears. Frank walked over stiffly and wrapped her in his arms.

“Shhh, shh, it’ll be okay,” he said. He rubbed her back.

“Please tell me I’ll stop feeling this way once we’re bonded?”  Darcy said.

“I dunno, washing my socks made my wife cry a lot,” Frank said. Darcy laughed, wiping her eyes.

“You’re an idiot. And I’m not washing your socks.”

“Wanna fool around a little?” he offered. “This is a little more cozy and the endorphins--”

“Will make me less crazy,” Darcy finished. “Yeah.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” she said. He kissed her mouth and then ran his hands under her shirt and over her breasts, thumbing her nipples until they hardened under his touch. Then he twisted them wickedly. She moaned. “You schmuck.”

“Yeah I am,” he joked.

“Bed, bed,” Darcy said, pulling him down onto the mattress.

Kissing was one of the pleasures of old-fashioned courting before knotting, all the Omega experts said, but kissing Frank wasn’t textbook. It wasn’t even like kissing Brock.  Frank was hot, hungry, and pushy. He kissed like it was a fight, chasing her mouth, grinding against her, trying to get her underneath him, gain the advantage. “You’re gonna get over him,” he told her, once he’d stopped trying to pin her down with his mouth for a moment.

“Yeah?” Darcy said.

“By getting under me,” he cracked.

 

*** 

Once she’d started unpacking her bag in the relaxation room that afternoon, Darcy realized she’d forgotten a spare set of contact lenses. Jane was helping her. “Do you want me to get them?” Jane asked.

“No, I can send Frank, keep him from scaring people in the hallways.” Jane laughed. “Frank,” Darcy said.

“Yeah?” he said. He was hovering, but distantly.

“I forgot my extra contact lenses. Can you get them from my apartment? They’re in my bathroom drawer,” she said.

“Are you giving me things to do? So I’ll stay busy?” Frank said wryly. He touched her forehead. “You feel okay?”

“Yeah, no symptoms yet. I feel the same,” she said. She smiled at him. He was being very civilized now that they were in the room and she wanted him to know she appreciated the effort. “Thank you,” she told him, “for everything.”

“I haven’t done anything yet,” he said. There was a moment of silence. Darcy looked around the room. It was pleasantly decorated in soothing shades of sea blue. Tranquil. SHIELD's goal was to make you feel like you were in a spa, not a state-funded sex enclosure. There was a scented air diffuser pumping out a soothing green tea blend, designed to help ease you into heat, and the lights were soft, not fluorescents. The sheets on the big bed were all white.

You could turn on the photostatic mirrors along one wall, the tech who'd brought them down said, "if that was your thing." Darcy supposed SHIELD didn't want to get sued by sex pollened employees and had put real money into this. But it wasn't like her own bed. Or Brock's. She remembered that he'd put different sheets on the bed the night they'd bonded. When she'd asked about them, it had turned out they were family heirlooms--they had Italian-made lace from Venice. Burano lace. The same stuff his grandmother's veil had been made of.

“Do you want coffee?” Jane asked Darcy suddenly. She was frowning at her.

“Sure,” Darcy said.

“I’ll go get you some,” she said.

“Thanks, Jane,” Darcy said. Jane looked askance at Frank before exiting. 

“You think we ran Foster off?” Frank asked, looking at her back.

“Probably,” Darcy said, grinning. Frank looked down at her and his expression turned wry.

“I know this is difficult," he said.

"Yeah," Darcy said.

"But you’ve got a good mouth,” he said. "I keep thinking that. Good mouth," he repeated.

“I like your tongue a lot,” she told him teasingly. Leaning down abruptly, he kissed her. Darcy pulled him down onto the bed and straddled him. His hands steadied her thighs on either side of his legs, then edged up slowly.

“This is normal for you?” he asked hotly.

“Mmm-hmm,” Darcy said. “You just wait, Frankie.” He squeezed her legs, thumbs digging into her buttocks. They wrestled for control of the kiss. Frank sucked at the bruises on her neck. “Uhhhhhhhhhhh,” Darcy moaned. She pressed herself against him, raking her hands through his hair.

 

“Ahem,” Jane said in the doorway. She'd brought back the coffee. “Isn’t this a little ahead of schedule?”

“Whoops,” Frank said.

“Possibly,” Darcy said, sliding off Frank’s lap without looking at Jane. She buttoned her shirt.

“I’ll be back soon,” he said, standing up.

“Uh-huh,” Jane said.

“I’ll probably be all crampy by then and make you sleep in the next room!” Darcy called. Frank laughed.

 

***

 

Frank was carrying a bag with some of Darcy’s belongings--he’d thought she might want some of them--out of the building when he met a meter reader from the power company. “Hey,” he said pleasantly.

“Good afternoon,” the man said. It was seventeen after five. Frank turned.

“Hey, uh, can I ask you a question?” Frank said casually.

 

The elderly Mrs. Gabor from downstairs was startled as she came up the sidewalk a minute later. That nice Pete with the friendly dog was kneeling over an unconscious man. “Why, Pete,” she said, “you’ve shaved off your beard.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said.

“It looks nice, young man. I don’t like these big beards. Is that man all right?” she said.

“Eh, I think he’ll live,” he said, shaking the man a fraction. “He just bumped his head on something hard.” A SHIELD van was already en route.

 

“What happened?” Steve said, when he arrived at the interrogation room at SHIELD.

“Frank Castle apprehended one of Rumlow’s men outside their building,” Maria Hill said, gesturing to the two way mirror. A man in a dark blue jumpsuit with the name “Jim” stitched into an oval was shackled to one of the SHIELD chairs. His face was bloody. There was a large lump on his forehead, his nose was smashed, and his eyes were already turning a sickly red-purple.

“What tipped you off?” Steve asked Frank. The man in the work uniform was still unconscious.

“His uniform was too clean and it was too late in the day,” Frank said. He got up. “Gonna see Darcy. Be back when he wakes up.”

 

“Why is Frank bruised?” Steve asked, when Frank had left the room, boots clunking away. A purple shadow was creeping across Frank’s forehead.

“He headbutted the guy,” Hill said. “I think he broke his nose, too.” Steve shook his head.

 

***

 

Darcy was itchy. Frank had been gone too long. “I’m so uncomfortable,” she told Jane. She’d been making a little blanket nest and already planted herself in it when Jane came to check on her.

“Exposure to that nutcase is accelerating your heat,” Jane said.

“Haha,” Darcy said sarcastically.

“I’m serious, I’m looking at your vitals,” Jane said, frowning at the tablet clipped into a wall holder. Darcy was outfitted with a wrist monitor. “Increased body temperature, heart rate, blood flow to reproductive areas already evident,” she read aloud. “It’s only been _two hours_ since you skipped your pills, that’s crazy.”

“Go find Frank and tell him, please,” Darcy said.

“Are you _sure?_ ” Jane asked.

“I need to get Brock out of my system,” Darcy said.

 

“This is a bad plan, a really bad plan,” Jane was muttering to herself when she ran into Frank, almost literally, in the hallway.

“You blinded from all the science?” he said wryly. She truly wanted to slap him.

“Her symptoms are increasing, faster than I’ve ever seen,” Jane said, glaring at him.

“I have that effect sometimes, tend to juice people up,” he said cryptically.

“Juice people up?” Jane said.

“Make other Alphas territorial and more aggressive, they get real stupid,” Frank said. “Also, these very nice Omegas tend to like me,” he said. “Always the real sweet ones? My lawyer’s assistant sort of befriended me while I was chained to my hospital bed, broke into my house during the trial--”

“What?” Jane said.

“They still had the tape around the hospital bed and everyone else was so terrified, they stayed by the door with the cops, shaking like leaves,” he said chuckling. “I’m surprised Murdock didn’t have Karen committed. I think it’s the way I smell,” Frank told Jane.

“Really?” Jane stared. She sniffled at him suspiciously and only got a faint tobacco. But Jane was bonded and had stopped smelling Alphas all that strongly after she got used to Thor’s intensely Asgardian scent--he smelled green and cool, like a snow-covered fir tree in winter.

“I’m gonna go see her now,” he said, moving down the hallway.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Meet Me In The Pale Moonlight is an unreleased LDR track (she has incredible unreleased songs); you can find it on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xN7NLKWol9I
> 
> Burano is one of the smaller islands of the Venetian lagoon, famous for lace-making--often for veils: https://www.martinavidal.com/en/burano.aspx


	7. Money Power Glory

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! I just felt like writing a little of this tonight. Thanks for all your comments and kudos!

“Darcy,” Frank said through the door of her secure SHIELD room. “Can I come in?”

“Yeah,” Darcy said. She opened the door for him. Frank stepped in, rubbing the back of his neck. “You’re hurt,” Darcy said. She reached out and touched his battered face. He grinned wryly. Darcy couldn’t take her hands off him.

“Small altercation with one of your husband’s guys,” Frank said. He leaned into her, inhaling. Not ready, his nose registered. She was warming up, though. Her scent was heavier than it had been before, clinging to the bedding. He’d smelled it as soon as the door opened.

“Who is he?” she asked.

“Jim,” Frank said, kissing her. “I’m going to go beat him a little for information and then come back and fool around with you, see where we are.”

“Do you have to go now?” Darcy asked, nuzzling him.

“Yeah,” Frank said seriously.

“Be careful with anyone who works for Brock,” she said.

“Brock,” he repeated dryly.

“I’m serious,” Darcy said. “He trained people for SHIELD. He’d train his mercs, too.”

“You’re safe here,” Frank said. “I’m only a few feet that way having fun with Jimbo.”

“I hate that I’m missing all the drama,” she told him jokingly.

“I’ll be back though.” He gave her an ambiguous, but intense look, then retreated. Darcy resettled herself in her blankets to wait for him.

 

She would be fine, she thought. Frank--Frank would be an excellent temporary Alpha--she had decided. Darcy wasn’t going to regret Frank. He was her escape from being linked to Brock forever. That thought had occurred to her in the last thirty minutes or so. That Frank could be a kind of bizarre clean slate. At the least, she could tell any future Alphas that Frank Castle had been hers: it would be enough to scare away anyone with trickery in mind and would allow Darcy to write Brock out of her life’s narrative, at least in public. At first, that had troubled her. Darcy hadn’t been certain that she wanted to write Brock out, erase their marriage. That still stung.   

 

She toyed with the star necklace at her throat. It was difficult to stay put. Darcy was curious about the activity going on all around her, while she waited, cut off from the world. It was oddly like being an old-fashioned captive, the princess in the tower, waiting for Prince Charming to show.

 

***

Frank didn’t precisely enjoy torturing Jim, but he was good at it. Good at violence. Good at force. Anger. Rage. The sound of tearing tissue and snapping bones could be like music. He was holding back with Jim, though. He’d hit him a few times, but not inflicted damage beyond that. If he hurt his hands, it might impede the fun he wanted to have with Darcy tonight. He wanted to be able to feel her. “We’ve got to stop this,” Steve said to Fury, watching from the other room.

“Let the man work, Cap,” Fury said.

“No,” Steve said, standing up. “It’s not right,” he told Fury. He walked into the other room. “Stop,” he said.

 

Frank--hunched a little in front in Jim, his hands on his thighs--turned to look at Cap. “You hear that, Jimbo?” he said wryly. He reached up and scratched his head. “Captain America thinks I’m being too hard on you? Ain’t that somethin’? You ever think you’d be here, your life going like this? Taking hits for Brock Rumlow ‘cause he ran out on his old lady? Huh?” Frank chuckled and shook his head, rubbing his chin idly with his fingers. They were a little bloody. He rubbed them over the top of his head, still chuckling. “Cap, I gotta say,” he said, turning to look at Steve, “you’re too good for this work--”

“Frank,” Cap began, deploying the scolding face that normally worked so well. He didn’t expect Frank to turn and swing, landing a hit to Jim’s abdomen that rocked the chair backwards and made Jim cough and gag. “Frank, stop,” Steve repeated.

“You want me to stop, Jim?” Frank said, leaning down into Jim’s face again. His hunched posture was oddly simian, Steve thought. Frank was animalistic, too dangerous. He moved to seize Frank’s arm, but Frank slapped Jim before he could get there. Jim flinched. “Just give me a number Jimbo,” Frank said coolly. “That’s all I need. Then I’ll hand you over to Cap there, he’s Mr. ACLU, Mr. Due Process, Mr. No Extrajudicial Imprisonment. You want to go with Cap. You don’t want to stay with me. I’m not that guy. I’m the guy who bashes people’s brains out. I’m Frank Castle.”

“You’re Frank Castle,” Jim repeated dully. “Frank Castle’s dead.”

“The dead don’t always stay dead, Jimbo. Look at Cap over there,” Frank said. “Everybody in this room but you has come back from the dead once or twice and I gotta say, I don’t like your odds.” Jim recoiled from Frank’s intense gaze. Something was happening behind his eyes.

“Why should I believe you?” Jim asked.

“Tell him I’m Frank Castle, Cap,” Frank said.

“He’s Frank Castle,” Steve said.

“See? Captain America wouldn’t lie. I don’t think you can lie, can you, Cap?” Frank asked. “It’s un-American. He lies, an apple pie turns out dry or a flag gets stepped on. Come on, Jimbo, play nice with me and you won’t die slowly in this room. It’s bad to die alone. I’ve seen it.” Jim looked away, sighed, made eye contact with Steve.

“Give him the number,” Steve said quietly. He wanted this to end. He nodded and Jim nodded back. He reeled off a string of numbers.

“Slow down now, I need a pen,” Frank chided, reaching for the pen and paper on the table nearby. “Repeat that?” he said to Jim. Frank wrote it down carefully. “Okay, Cap,” Frank said, with an efficient, casual tone. “He’s all yours. I’m off to phone a friend.” He patted Steve as if he was leaving a bar and left the room.

 

Steve looked down at his shirt. He could see a faint imprint of Frank’s hand in blood on his shoulder. Jim’s blood. “Get me out of here,” Jim said. “Please.”

 

***

 

Frank dialed the number on the cell phone he’d fished out of Jim’s uniform pocket, putting his feet on the table. He waited for a voice to answer. “Yes? What’s your status?” someone said coolly. Their accent was Australian.

“I want your boss, pal,” Frank said. He knew Rumlow wasn’t Australian. “Get me Brock Rumlow. That’s some goddamn name, by the way.”

“Hello?” a second voice said. “Who is this?” Frank knew he had the right man this time. There was a thread of tension in that voice. It was slight, but you could hear it.

“I’m, uh, well, shit, who am I?” Frank said, frowning and rubbing his nose. “Let’s just say I’m the guy who is gonna fuck your wife tonight. But you can call me Pete.”

 

There was a moment of silence.

 

“You don’t have anything to say? Huh. That’s real interesting. Most Alphas--shit, most men, period--they got something to say about that. Do I need to give you a minute to, uh, gather your thoughts, Brock?” Frank said. He stressed the other man’s name. “Brock. Is that, uh, a family name or something? You from a long line of Brocks? Maybe they all abandoned their pretty little wives, when the shit hit the fan,” Frank mused.

 

On the other end of the line, Brock Rumlow was breathing. Very slowly. He finally spoke. “You think you can fuck with me?” he asked. His voice was low and quiet.

“Oh, I know I can,” Frank said. “I’m gonna fuck with you and then I’m going to fuck her. It’ll be fun, Brock. I’m guessing I can call you Brock? We’re sorta like social acquaintances now, aren’t we? The ex and the new guy? She’s so great. Such a sweet little thing. Did you love how she smelled like cupcakes? Me, I love that. I was always the kid who wanted to eat dessert even if I hadn’t eaten all my vegetables, you know?” Frank said. He looked up. Steve Rogers was standing in the doorway, staring in horror.

“What are you doing?” Steve said in a hiss. Frank waved a hand at him dismissively and kept talking.

“I remember this one time, at Freddy Castellano’s twelfth birthday party, I snuck into the kitchen and ate his cake. It wasn’t even my fucking birthday, Brock”--the silence on the line was tense--”but you know what? Eating another kid’s cake is the best goddamn thing in the world,” Frank said. "You ever eat another kid's cake? Take something that wasn't yours and just shove it in your mouth? I mean, just shove it in---"

There was an audible beep when the line disconnected. Frank looked at the phone and frowned. “He hung up on me,” Frank said. He started to laugh. “The fucker hung up on me!”

“Are you out of your mind?” Steve said. “You were baiting Brock Rumlow?!”

“Just what part of Brooklyn are you from, Cap?” Frank wondered out loud. “I gotta say, it seems like a magical place.”  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> God, I love writing Frank as a smartass. Again, all chapter titles/moods= Lana del Rey songs. Money Power Glory: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3t8L5sfJto


	8. Elvis

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos.

There was a moment of silence between the two men on the black market quinjet. They were en route to their destination, working in a makeshift office. “He’ll pay for that, mate,” Jack said to Brock. He said it carefully. Brock was gripping the phone tightly. His fingers were white and Jack could hear the phone plastic beginning to crack. Brock breathed slowly, then looked at Jack. “Give me a second alone,” Brock said.

Jack stepped out into the adjoining room. Brock hated to lose control in front of other people. He prided himself on his self-control.

A few minutes later, Jack tapped lightly on the door. “Come in,” Brock said. “You afraid of me, Jack?” he said, with the ghost of chuckle.

“No, no,” Jack said. “Of course not,” he lied, his eyes avoiding the broken things on the desk.

“I recognize that voice,” he said. “I know him. Who is he?” Brock stood, walked to the monitor on the wall, and tapped a few buttons. Jack kept a careful distance as the former HYDRA system ran an audio trace. It would match the phone call they’d just recorded with all kinds of audio--news casts, HYDRA-monitored phone calls, court proceedings. The black and green codes skimmed the screen, casting a strange shadow across Brock’s burned face and mangled ear. 

They waited twenty minutes before there was a beep signifying an audio match. Brock tapped the screen and news footage appeared. A man in an orange jumpsuit with a bruised face. The same man, this time in a dark suit, testifying in court and screaming:  
  
_"Well, here I am! You want it, you got it! I am the Punisher! I'm right here! You want it, I'll give it to you. And anybody who came here today to hear me whine, to hear me beg? Well, you can kiss my ass! I'm guilty, you hear me! I'm guilty!"_

“Frank Castle?” Jack said, stunned.

“I knew I recognized his voice,” Brock said, a grin crossing his face.

“I thought Frank Castle was dead?” Jack said.

“Lots of people we know are dead,” Brock said to him. “You’re dead, too.” He was smiling to himself. “Get the team together. There’s been a small change in plans. How long before we get to DC?”

Jack stared at Brock. He seemed--happier? But that was impossible, Jack thought. Frank Castle? The Punisher?! “It’s, uh, two-three hours, mate? Should I check our weapons’ supply?” Jack asked.

“Sure,” Brock said. “Do whatever you would normally do.” He sounded perfectly calm. It was eerie. “Jack?” Brock said, as Jack moved to the doorway.

“Yeah?” Jack asked.

“Do you think my wife will be afraid of me?” Brock asked.

“Of course not,” Jack lied. “It’s Darcy. She could tase you, though.”

Brock threw back his scarred face and laughed. “She could,” he said wryly, more to himself than Jack. “She could tase me,” he said to himself. “It might be fun.”

 

***

 

Jane was walking through the building, looking for Thor and Dog, when she heard Steve’s voice. He sounded agitated. “Frank, you cannot antagonize Brock Rumlow,” Steve was saying. The two men were facing each other at the edge of a doorway. Frank looked incredulous. He was tilting his head at Steve.

“What did he do?” Jane asked. Steve turned at the sound of her voice. He looked stern and upset. “What did he do?” Jane repeated.

“He antagnized Brock,” Steve said, “purposefully antagonized him. Recklessly.”

“I think we had a nice talk,” Frank said. “He’s not real chatty, though, is he? Didn’t say much.”

“What did you say?” Jane said, a knot of anxiety forming in her stomach.

“He said things about cake,” Steve said slowly. “That I won’t repeat in front of you, Jane. It was incredibly stupid and reckless.”

“Is he for real? I keep trying to figure out if he’s for real?” Frank asked Jane. “This whole, ‘aw, shucks, I can’t say that in front of a lady’ routine, that’s for real?”

“Cake?” Jane said, frowning.

“I just expressed to him that eating somebody else’s birthday cake is a life-altering experience, you know? It really, uh, sparks joy? Isn’t that what the kids are sayin’ now?” Frank said, moving back to sit down inside the interrogation anteroom and look at the phone. “You think he’ll call back?” he asked, putting his feet on the table again.

“Shit,” Jane said, remembering what Darcy smelled like, even to her less-sensitive, firmly bonded nose. Sweet. Like cake.

“Oh, Cap’s not gonna like that, Doc,” Frank told Jane. Steve sighed.

“You need to take this seriously. This is not a joke or a game. Brock Rumlow is a serious threat,” Steve said. “He is well-trained and he is”--Steve paused, trying to convey the precise level of shock he’d experienced during the Uprising and what that said about Rumlow’s nature--”level-headed.”

“Level-headed?” Frank said, cocking an eyebrow.

“Yes,” Steve said. He looked at Jane. “Wouldn’t you say that, Jane?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said. To Jane, Frank did not appear to be taking this seriously. But she was. “He is calm,” Jane said. “Even during the HYDRA Uprising, he was calm.”

“How did you know?” Steve asked.

“Darcy and I saw the footage from Natasha’s info dump of the SHIELD files,” Jane said. They’d watched it many times. “He’s calm because he’s a sociopath, Frank. He doesn’t feel things like a normal person, so it’s not safe to depend on normal human reactions.”

“Exactly,” Steve said. “Thank you, Jane.” Frank made a face. “What?” Steve said to Frank.

"How's that make him different from any other asshole?" Frank said.

"Tell Thor I’m looking for him,” Jane said to Steve, turning on her heel. Jane was going to help Darcy, even if she was surrounded by violent lunatics, she thought. On her way out, Jane passed Natasha. Natasha crooked an eyebrow at the raised voices coming from inside. “Tactical dispute,” Jane said. “Frank goaded Rumlow on the phone, Steve’s worried.”

“I’ll talk to them,” Nat said.

“Good luck,” Jane said.

 

***

 

“So, he’s real quiet naturally that’s what you’re sayin’, Cap?” Frank  was saying, when Natasha walked in. “A soft-spoken Nazi?”

“No, what I’m trying to say is--” Steve said.

“Gentlemen, can we postpone this argument? I have news about Rumlow’s whereabouts,” Natasha said.

“Yeah?” Frank said, sitting up.

“An agent of King T’Chaka says he set up a meeting with Ulysses Klaue in Accra in ten hours. Weapons trade. The Dora Milaje are going to try to get Klaue,” Nat said.

“Then we should get Rumlow before he tries to snatch Darcy or kill Frank,” Steve said. “I’ll call Sam and Wanda, see if they’re busy.” Wanda Maximoff was studying at GWU and also learning how to use her powers. Similarly, Sam Wilson lived in DC and occasionally lent a hand. Steve thought Rumlow would be less able to anticipate their actions than he would a regular STRIKE unit; he’d trained the STRIKE units, but not Wanda or Sam. Otherwise, Steve would never have put Wanda and Sam at risk, but surprise was invaluable with someone who knew you as well as Rumlow had known him. They’d worked together for two years, Steve thought grimly; it was the kind of tactical advantage you never wanted someone to have over you. When he sighed, Frank looked at him speculatively.

“I’ve already talked to Wanda and Sam, they’re ready,” Natasha said. “Tony is out of town with Pepper, I thought it best to leave them alone.”

“What if this is a trap, huh?” Frank said suddenly. “Make a lotta noise over here, he can go this way,” he suggested.

“The intel comes from a source close to the Wakandan royal family,” Nat said. She shared a significant glance with Steve. “Very reliable,” she said. Last year, Steve had discovered some vibranium while chasing Rumlow and Bucky. He’d returned it to Wakanda, over Fury’s objections, earning the friendship of Crown Prince T’Challa. A very close source, Steve knew, had to be Nakia, the woman T’Challa wanted to marry, who did aid work in West Africa and acted as Wakanda’s eyes and ears for many things. Last he’d heard from T’Challa, Nakia was with an NGO in Ghana. Nakia was trustworthy. She sort of reminded him of Peggy, if he was honest. Didn’t take any guff. Even from a Prince.

“If that’s so, I trust it,” Steve said.

“You want me to go with you?” Frank offered.

“No,” Steve said reflexively. “You stay here.” Frank was exactly the kind of person Steve never wanted on his team.

“All right, Cap, I’ll hold down the fort,” Frank said, smirking.

“We leave in ten,” Steve said to Nat. “We’ll have Thor stay in town, too, in case of emergencies.”

 

***

Darcy was waiting when someone knocked. “It’s me,” Jane said. “I brought you something.”

“More coffee?” Darcy said, opening the door. “Please let it be more coffee?”

“Yes, but also something else,” Jane said quietly.

“Gah, I’m all itchy, Jane. It’s never been this annoying before,” she said, letting the scientist in.

“It’s Frank,” Jane said grimly. Mentally she added, _Frank the crazy idiot._

“You hate Frank, don’t you?” Darcy said.

“I loathe and despise him,” Jane said honestly. “I want you to be with someone nice and kind and, um, not so murdery?”

“Thor’s not exactly a pacifist,” Darcy pointed out.

“It’s really unfair that you can use that against me when ninety percent of the time, he wears footie pajamas and watches _Toy Story_ with you,” Jane said.

“But I love you,” Darcy told her, “especially when you bring me coffee. What’s my other thing? Is it chocolate? I’d appreciate it if was chocolate--”

“It’s this,” Jane said, handing her a filled syringe. The needle was capped and it was in a plastic tube for safety. “I went to see my friend in medical, Laura. She gave it to me.”

“Um, Jane,” Darcy said. “What is it?”

“It will stop your heat,” Jane said. “If, at any time, you want to stop this or end it early, you go for that syringe. Promise me, if you have even a little bit of doubt, you’ll send Frank on an errand, hit the panic button, and use that. He can’t compel you to do anything if you don’t bond and--”

“Jane,” Darcy said tenderly, “thank you.”

“Inject it slowly, though. Laura says it you do it too fast, it can make you dizzy or sleepy.”

“If I feel at all like anything might be bad, I will,” Darcy said. “I promise you, Jane.”

 

On the night before her wedding, Darcy had had the jitters. Mostly about tripping going down the aisle or something. Messing up her vows. Brock not showing up. All the usual, normal stuff. Jane had told her it would be okay. They’d been pretty innocent then, Darcy realized, but she’d suspected afterwards that Jane regretted not vocalizing her unease about Brock. She was more open now. It was simply guilt, Darcy thought, hugging Jane, that she hadn’t been able to protect Darcy from getting hurt.

Wasn’t it funny how all your friends and loved ones--even strangers who’d met Brock through SHIELD has expressed guilt to Darcy--felt like they should have known something about HYDRA? But the people who did the hurting, they never seemed to care? They had a million excuses. She’d seen some of the trial footage of the HYDRA arrestees. To hear them tell it, either they were “just following orders,” or “didn’t know HYDRA was that bad.” Darcy assumed Brock’s excuses would be more creative, but no less hollow.

 

***

 

Jane stayed with her until a bloody Frank returned. “You and Thor be safe,” Darcy said, “go home and play with Dog, okay? I’ll be fine.”

“I see you treating him like your dog,” Frank said wryly.

“Shut up, Frank,” Jane grumbled.

“I love you, Janey,” Darcy said, hugging her. “Everything will be fine.”

 

“I’m going to shower,” Frank said, when Jane had gone. Darcy looked up from her coffee. He looked almost shy, a little tentative, Darcy thought. “I wouldn’t want you to be horrified by me like your doctor friend,” he said, gesturing to the blood on his hands.

“She doesn’t think you’re horrifying, she just thinks you’re dangerous, there’s a difference,” Darcy explained. “And I’m not afraid of you, so either way?” Darcy shrugged.

“Oh, yeah?” Frank said. He grinned and moved into the bathroom. She heard the water start. A few minutes later, a wet-haired Frank stuck his head around the corner of the bathroom door. “Jane never even liked me when she thought I was Pete,” he said, making a thoughtful face. It reminded Darcy of Dog, oddly.

“I don’t understand why you’re so bothered, if you’re not sticking around?” Darcy said teasingly.

“Good point,” he said, grinning and disappearing back into the bathroom. "She tell you I talked to Brock? Jim gave me his number. I thought we might have some common interests, but it turns out he doesn't like me."

"What did you say?" Darcy said. She could hear him brushing his teeth.

"He didn't like my story about eating another kid's cake. I've always thought that was a fun story, you know? Seemed to bother him?" Frank said, emerging. He was wrapped in a towel.

"Because I'm the cake?" Darcy said.

"Maybe," Frank said, tilting his head back and forth. He had a great  _eh_ face. Darcy eyed him speculatively. “You like this, huh?” he said, looking down at his bare, still-damp torso.

“You’re all right,” Darcy said. “Not bad.”

“Your ex was forty-three!” he said.

“Still in better shape than you,” Darcy said.

“You’re fucking kidding me,” Frank said. "No forty-some year old--”

“Eat your words,” Darcy said. She tapped her phone and brought up a photo of a shirtless Brock on their honeymoon in Mexico, handing it to Frank. Frank was in very good shape, but he lacked Brock’s lean, extraordinary body.

“Shit,” Frank said, staring at the image.

“He was almost supernaturally fit. Two hours in the gym every morning,” Darcy said. “Took very good care of himself, in addition to the HYDRA stuff. He used to get up at four, work out, and come back to me before work.” .

“To fuck?” Frank said.

“Sometimes,” Darcy said. “Sometimes, he said he just wanted to be with me.”

 

 

“What was he like?” Frank asked later, holding Darcy’s hand. He’d put on pants and sat on the edge of the bed at first, but she coaxed him into bed with her. They were still doing the hurry up and wait thing. Frank had told her that she smelled about 12 hours from full heat, so he was going to skip his evening suppressant dose. Now he was toying with her fingers as she rested, burrowed in the blankets. There was a little space between them. Frank didn't crowd her.

“Hmmm?” Darcy said.

“Your sex life?” Frank said. “With Mr. Calm, Mr. Fitness? What was it like?”

“Very good,” Darcy admitted. “He was, uh, very loving?”

“Loving, huh?” he said.

“He actually liked this part, the waiting part,” Darcy said. “I have no patience and zero virtues"--Frank chuckled--"so it irritated me, but he was very patient.” She swallowed. “He said he thought it made us closer, all the time we spent alone, waiting, talking, just being together.”

"Interesting," Frank said.

"That's one way to describe your husband being a secret Nazi," she said. Frank smirked.

Darcy thought about how Brock would hold her and she would trace the outlines of his Thai tattoos with her fingers. She’d memorized them, so she could do it with her eyes closed. How he raked his hands through her hair and massaged her scalp methodically to make her feel good when she was tired. Or talked about where he’d gone that he wanted to take her, all the trips he imagined in their future. He’d wanted her to see the port town of Trapani, where some of his relatives had come from one day. But while she waited to go into cycle, they would lay together in the bed while he talked about the light on the water and the calm, steady sound of the waves. He'd managed to make it pleasant for her, even enjoyable. He'd listened to her favorite music, too. Somehow, they'd ended up in a strange little world of their own. 

She missed the playful way that he kissed her, too. He had been as into kissing as he was into travel or rock climbing: he was a kind of sensory experimentalist, half thrill junkie, half methodical observer. No one had ever kissed Darcy like Brock kissed her. She had always felt that he paid careful attention to everything, how enthusiastically she responded to the brush of his five o’ clock shadow against her skin or sucked her upper lip. He could be startlingly gentle for someone capable of such violence. She had seen him defeat other STRIKE agents in the gym with brutal suddenness. She knew he’d killed people. But when she dreamed of him, it was often about the way he would cup her face and kiss her slowly. The way he smoothed her frown lines with his thumb and teasingly told her to be more patient when she complained about heat cycles being biologically unfair. Or how much he liked resting his head across her chest. When she’d teased him about being obsessed with her boobs, he’d tilted his face up to look at her. “I like listening to your heartbeat and your breathing,” he’d said softly. “Makes me feel calm.”

_I should have known it wasn't real,_ she thought. 

“There was lots of kissing,” she admitted to Frank, without elaboration.

“Kissing? Nazis who kiss, that’s new,” he said, chuckling.

“He was very good at compartmentalizing,” Darcy said. There was a pause. “What about you? What was it like?” she asked tentatively. She didn’t know if it would hurt his feelings. Frank looked at her, frowned, then, focused on the far walls.

“I was deployed for nine months of the year, sometimes more,” he said. “Deployed for my whole marriage. Wasn’t something we did often. And with the kids--,” he said vaguely. He chuckled. “The last time, I remember, the minute we were separated, she got up to do laundry. I teased her about not wanting to cuddle with me and how much it hurt my heart, that she was using me for sex like that. You know what Maria said?” He rubbed a finger across his mouth, smiling.

“What?” Darcy asked, thankful he didn’t seem upset.

“Get over yourself, Frank, the kids need clean underwear,” he said, laughing. “She didn’t take any shit from me.”

“That’s awesome,” Darcy said, laughing.

“She was pretty great,” he said. “I mean, it’s not kissing Nazis, but it was pretty great.”

“Shut up, I hear you making fun of me,” Darcy said.

“I’m just saying, all your marriage stories with this guy are little weird, you realize that right?” he said. “Wasn’t a normal relationship, it was some romance novel bullshit.”

“No shit, Frank,” Darcy said archly, “that’s because it was fictional.” She stressed the last word.

“Oh, ouch,” Frank said, laughing. “You said it, not me.”

 

They were both silent for a few minutes.

 

“Nobody’s ever complained when I kiss ‘em, though,” Frank said suddenly.

“No?” Darcy said archly. She honestly enjoyed the easy, yet barbed back and forth. Was there something weird about her that she found him funny, not frightening?

“Nope,” Frank said. He let go of her hand and put his arms behind his head. Darcy grinned. Was Frank showing off his muscles?

“Oh sure,” she said. “I believe that.”

“Haven’t I kissed you enough yet?” Frank said.

“I might need more practice,” Darcy said.

“Yeah, you’ve been in a dry spell, huh?” he said. She swatted at him with a pillow and he laughed.

 

He grinned more widely when she climbed on top of him, though. Darcy ran her hands over his body curiously, starting with the underside of his arms. They felt muscular, but softer, somehow? He was younger than Brock and probably heavier. Higher body fat, Darcy guessed? Brock had been obsessed with maintaining his seven percent body fat, which meant there was no softness in him, not physically. He was all discipline.

She heard his voice in her head, Brock on that notorious tape, the last words she’d ever heard him say, really: _“Order only comes through pain.”_ He'd said it to Sam, actually. He hadn’t said anything to her in the hospital, so those were it, technically-speaking.

Darcy wiggled uncomfortably, eyes locked on one of Frank’s biceps. “What are you doing, Lewis?” Frank asked.

“Getting comfortable,” she said. The truth was that Frank’s torso was wider, too. It was surreal to compare them like this, she thought.

“You gonna kiss me or just knee me while you think about your ex?” Frank joked.

“Shut up,” Darcy said, but the words were hardly out of her mouth before Frank cupped the back of her head to bring their faces closer. They were a fraction of an inch apart. His eyes studied her face, making Darcy feel oddly seen. It was almost too much to bear. Had he not been holding her so close, she would have drawn back instinctively, protected herself. He seemed to sense that and pulled her a fraction closer, his eyes trained on hers.

“Nobody wants to be alone. Nobody,” Frank said, before he closed the distance between them.

 

This time, the kiss was wasn’t aggressive or pushy. It was soft.

 

***

 

The team on the quinjet was being briefed on the meeting with Klaue in Ghana. “It appears that Klaue and Rumlow have developed some sort of partnership,” a STRIKE agent told Steve.

“That’s not terribly surprising,” Sam Wilson said. “Dirtbags stick together.”

“He’s bought a lot of black market equipment and weapons. We think he may have purchased some sort of stolen stealth plane tech,” the agent said.

“What kind of tech?” Nat asked.

“Quinjets, possibly. Our reports have been sketchy. It sounds unbelievable,” the agent said.

“Stealth tech from Klaue is not entirely unbelievable,” Steve said. He’d kept what he knew about Wakandan technology quiet. He wasn’t going to cause panic at SHIELD. Fury would overreach. Or want all the shiny things for himself. And T’Challa’s jet--Steve had seen it with his own eyes--was better hidden than anything they had at SHIELD, even though Tony had upgraded them so SHIELD’s helicarriers were virtually invisible in the skies. A Wakandan jet was invisible and untraceable.

“I would like to see Klaue again,” Wanda said. She had been trying to make amends for her misguided alliance with Ultron, the one that had inadvertently killed her brother and many other innocent civilians. Klaue had been the source of the vibranium, after all.

“Klaue will recognize you, Wanda, so I want you to focus on tailing Rumlow unobtrusively,” Steve told her seriously. He had mixed feelings about getting Wanda involved, but knew she the same age he had been when he enlisted. There was that burning desire to matter, to do something.

“I wouldn’t mind seeing Rumlow again,” Sam said. Casually. That was an old rivalry.

“You think you can win this time? Without help from a collapsing building?” Nat said teasingly.

“Oh, that’s cold, that’s Siberia cold,” Sam said. Wanda smiled briefly.

“That’s why Barton calls her Mother Russia,” Steve said. “Are we ready?”

 

***

 

Frank wheezed slightly whenever he breathed through his nose to kiss her, Darcy realized. It was a tiny, almost imperceptible sound, but oddly human. He’d probably bashed his nose in a fight, she thought. A part of Darcy’s brain had registered the faint noise while he was gently teasing her bottom lip. She opened her eyes to look at him. His facial expression was focused, eyes half-closed. It made her feel slightly mischievous. He’d turned them on their sides at some point, so he could mark her neck again. This time, he did it with a kind of careful tenderness. Darcy had taken the opportunity to turn on the room’s photostatic mirrors, just to watch the muscles in his back move while he re-bruised her neck with that strange care. Now she pressed her chest against his, raking her nails lightly against his back. She was being the aggressive one. Frank groaned. “Slow down,” he grumbled, pulling his mouth away. “You still got hours before I can really fuck you.” His breathing had increased, gotten shallower when she brought their bodies closer.

“You’re enjoying this,” she sassed him. “Having an excuse to take your time.” Darcy arched an eyebrow.

“Shh,” Frank said, kissing her again.

 

In the room, their kissing was cut short by the sound of sirens. Darcy stopped rubbing his back, alert. Frank pulled away from her mouth and shook his head a little, as if he was waking from sleep. “I’ll check it out,” Frank said.

“Frank,” Darcy said. “Don’t--don’t go.”

“Don’t be getting all attached yet,” Frank said archly. “I’ll be back, Lewis. It’s probably just somebody smoking and setting off the fucking fire alarms.” The sharpness of his voice was undercut by the gentle hand he put on her cheek. "It'll be fine."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yitma0spOCk
> 
> So, lots of A/B/O fic separates the main pairings while the Omega goes into cycle to increase tension (coercively or not) but I was sort of musing on the idea of what you'd do with all that time if you were bonded and went off suppressants in this chapter. That and Plot! shenanigans. What would couples do with the time when the Omega is sort of stuck in 3-day hormonal symptoms?
> 
> Darcy: this is an irritating, boring aspect of my biology, I am grump  
> Brock: it's okay, listen to this place I've been, we'll go one day. *constructs elaborate alt-version of future in stories that he intellectually knows is implausible--b/c he's Pierce's plaything and will Trapani even exist, post-Insight?--but the fantasy is somehow soothing for him*
> 
> Frank & Maria: cutely bicker about household chores, color with the kids, or whatever


	9. Backfire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos!

“Everything ready?” Jack said quietly, as they stood as the edge of the quinjet ramp. Below them, the lights of DC twinkled in the dark. They were going to the current SHIELD headquarters, a sprawling suburban complex that had replaced the Triskelion. Because it was a rented space, rather than a federally-constructed one, it was massive, low, and difficult to secure. The blueprints had once been publicly available. That gave them an advantage. There would be panic as agents rushed to secure the exits and entrances and fight off the multifaceted raids on SHIELD’s remaining valuables.

“Yeah,” Brock said. “I’m calm.”

“Boss’s always calm,” one of the nearest mercs joked. Several laughed. They’d gathered their gear: guns, parachutes, SWAT-level armor.

“He doesn’t get nervous!” a second man said. That was a crack about his nerve damage. Brock looked over his shoulder at the assembled team of mercenaries. He’d expanded his team since his days of being Pierce’s lackey. There were multiple quinjets. Theft was more lucrative and rewarding than HYDRA. Not that he cared much about HYDRA now. He had different goals in mind.

“It’s because I don’t work that way anymore,” he said dryly, lowering his mask. The mercs laughed.

“We’re in range!” the pilot called.

“You sure you don’t want someone with you?” Jack asked.

“He’ll be on you and the team,” Brock said quietly to Jack. “He left that wife and kids he loved so much for Afghanistan because he couldn’t stay away from a fight.” His voice was slightly muffled. They had studied Castle. “He’s still Frank Castle. Man can’t leave a fight alone. He’ll go for you, he won’t stay with her.”

“Yeah,” Jack said grimly.

“I want you to be steady and get out with the stuff when I say, don’t engage Castle,” Brock said. “You get too wound up when a man hits you. I remember Cap in that street.” Jack grinned ferally.

“You shoulda let me shoot him,” he said to Brock.

“I’ve got a few regrets, Jack, but don’t be sloppy.”

“Masks down!” Jack called. The assembled men were dressed in identical gear. “You know the plan. Hernandez and Glover’s teams to the west for the vaults, Kellison to the east for the armory, Rice to the north for R&D. I take the south team. Vehicles and evac quinjets waiting in twenty. Move out!”

Jack lept first. A long line of men followed him, each of their ‘chutes opening silently in the darkness. From the ramp of the quinjet, Brock leaned down to watch the them drift downwards. In the moonlight, all the open parachutes reminded him of dandelions. They were raining down on SHIELD. His quinjet tilted slightly to the left, nearer a particular building. He was landing on the roof. “How long does the stealth mode work?” Brock called to the pilot.

“Ten minutes, sir,” the pilot called, “I’ll hover.”

“Don’t go far, I’ll be back,” Brock said, stepping out into the empty air. He loved the feeling of the ground disappearing and being replaced by nothingness.

His ‘chute had opened flawlessly and his feet had just touched the flat roof of Medical when he heard gunfire. He smiled to himself. He could smell a warm scent in the air. Sweet, like cake. He knew that scent. Above him, the quinjet circled, unseen.

 

***

 

Frank emerged from the secured wing that held the relaxation rooms into a full-on emergency. “What the fuck is going on?” he yelled at a passing tech. People were arming themselves from a previously-hidden locker and streaming out onto the grounds.

“We’re being raided,” he yelled. “Looks like a HYDRA cell attacking the main compounds! They want the Chitauri weapons and our R&D. We’ve got to push them back onto the grounds. The Avengers have been recalled from Accra. Backup’s on the way.”

“What about this building?” Frank said.

“We’re sealing it in three minutes!” the tech yelled. “No high-value targets. Medical lockdown!”

“Well, shit,” Frank said. He wanted to get eyes on the raiders before he went back to Darcy. Her room was secured from the inside. Plus, Frank wasn’t the kind of man to dodge a fight. He always brought the fight. He grabbed a few of the guns and followed the sound of gunfire.

 

***

Frank had been gone for a minute or two when there was a sound above Darcy’s head. A scraping sound. She looked up, alarmed. “What the hell?” she said. A second later, one of the ceiling tiles had collapsed. She yelled involuntarily, then grabbed the syringe Jane had left her and scrambled frantically for the emergency button along the wall. A fraction of a second after she hit it, she realized, to her horror, that it was made not to free her quickly or get immediate help, but to seal her inside the room. Because of her heat. Through the small window glass she could see bars sliding down, acting as a cage for the room.The designer’s assumption had been that an omega would be safer inside than out and hadn’t anticipated a breech from above, someone emerging from the vents system. Darcy tried to beat on the door, screaming for help. But whatever had drawn Frank’s attention had drawn the attention of SHIELD’s other employees, too. She was all alone.

 

Darcy realized she still had the syringe in her hand. Tearing apart the plastic casing, she uncapped it and stabbed herself in the arm frantically. “Please work, please work,” she muttered. Within seconds, she could feel the drugs taking effect. She swayed a little, unsteady. She heard a new noise and turned slowly, leaning against the door. There was a slight whirring sound as a black-suited figure attached to a rope descended into her room from the ceiling vents. She was trapped inside with them. Darcy squinted--her eyesight was slightly blurry--but she thought the body armor and heavy mask looked like the ones used by Brock’s men. “No,” she said. “No.”

Darcy ran for her bags, frantically digging for her taser. She grabbed it and fired straight at the chest of the masked figure who seemed to be walking towards her with unusual slowness. Everything seemed slow to Darcy. The prongs landed and twitched--she could hear the sound of the taser working--but the figure was unmoved. It looked down at it’s chest. Darcy could swear there was curiosity in the masked glance. A gloved hand reached up and pried away the prongs as if they were nothing. The figure actually held an end for a moment before dropping it. Darcy hit the recharge button frantically. “No, no, no,” she repeated.

“Darcy,” a too-familiar voice said, “Darcy, it’s me. Put the taser down, baby. You’re safe, you’re safe.” His hands went around her wrists and his tone shifted to a more commanding one. “Come with me. Now,” he ordered. “We don’t have time. Trust me.”

“Brock,” she said, looking into that blank mask.

***

It was impressive to watch Thor with Mjolnir, Cameron Klein thought, as the tech analysts barricaded themselves in the room with the computer mainframes. Someone had decided glass walls were necessary. An idiot, Cam, thought, wishing for steel walls. At least it gave them a view of the mercs being hit with Asgard’s famous hammer of destiny. They were protecting SHIELD’s valuable data. “What have they got?” one of the agents yelled over comms. Cameron heard Sharon Carter’s voice faintly. “Shit, they raided the Chitauri weaponry!” the agent yelled.

“Whose idea was it to put it all in one place?” one of the analysts said dryly.

“Senator Yarmouth of Tennessee, chairman of the National Security committee,” Cam said, sighing. After the HYDRA Uprising, a Senate Committee had objected to SHIELD’s use of covert warehouses all over America. They had insisted everything be moved to one location. It had been determined this was the only place suitable, since towns objected to having SHIELD warehouses in their jurisdictions; small towns lacked the necessary personnel, larger ones worried about mass terrorist events.

That meant there were lots of SHIELD toys to steal and everyone knew where they were. Cameron ducked down and covered his curly hair when the glass shattered around him.

 

***

 

Darcy felt sick: she half-wanted to cling to the taser, hit Brock, flee. But it was like her hands and part of her mind were working against her as soon as she heard his voice. Their bond pulled her towards him, not away. It still had power. She was trembling with the effort of trying to resist her own body. Her muscles actually shook as the instinct to run warred with the desire to lean against him, curl up on his shoulder and ask to be held.

The taser clattered to the floor.

He pulled her into his arms and she started to cry, overwhelmed. “Good, good job, baby,” he said, tone softer. “Let’s go,” he said.

“I can’t--I can’t,” Darcy said.

“Sure you can. Come on,” he said. “Darcy, please.” She had never been able to say no to him. She froze in place, torn. She must have felt terrified, because his voice--and his feelings across their bond--were soothing and reassuring: “It’s okay, baby, it’s okay. I’m here now.”

He reached up and gingerly lifted the mask off his face. It was the first time she’d seen him since the hospital, when his burns had been fresh. Now his burns were no longer raw, but the scars slashed across his face, deep, painful-looking gouges. He was breathing more rapidly than she expected and there was something wild and hurt in his eyes, despite the calmness of his tone.

“Brock,” she said, her heart twisting, “your eyes.” They were bloodshot and oddly battered. _His beautiful eyes,_ her mind supplied. She reached up to touch his scarred cheek.

“I think I look pretty good, all things considered,” he said, swallowing. She could feel his terror, his hesitation. He was afraid. They stood staring at each other for a long moment. “Thought maybe you wouldn’t be able to stand the sight of me,” he said. Darcy shook her head and gave in to the urge to go soft in his arms. “You in love with Castle?” he asked, holding her. She could feel the spike in fear again.

“No,” she said, immediately overwhelmed by his rush of relief. It made her feel almost giddy. He was wild with happiness, she realized. It buoyed her up.

“Come with me.” He slid a hand low on her back and led her towards the side of the room where the ceiling tile had fallen down. He rebuckled his harness to the line and wrapped his arm around her waist. The rope raised both of them into the vents system and he began pulling her through gently. The vents were large enough for Darcy and Brock to crouch. “This way,” he said. Within moments, they were emerging onto the roof and Brock was half-dragging her out of a roughly-hewn exit. It looked like he’d blasted a hole in the roof with small-grade explosives. They stepped out into the dark. Darcy breathed in fresh air. Between the breeze, the distant gunfire, and her heat-suppressing medication, she felt more clear-headed and less compliant for a second. She began to pull backward, away from him. “Baby,” he said again, voice firm. She quailed, but struggled simultaneously on the inside.

“Let me go,” she said.

“No,” he said, “I’ll never do that again. I promise. I made a mistake, you understand? Shouldn’t have left you behind.” He held her against his chest for a moment and she felt herself melting, forgetting her objections. She could feel how much he loved her.

There was a noise in the air. Like a quinjet.

“What is that?” Darcy said, lifting her head and looking around.

“Back up,” Brock said to Darcy, moving her backwards. “Let her see you,” he said over comms. In front of Darcy a quinjet eased into being. Catching her look of amazement, Brock grinned. “An acquaintance happened to steal some stealth tech from Wakanda,” he told her. “I’ve just stood him up for a meeting, but I think he’ll forgive me when he sees what I’ve got now.”

“No,” Darcy said, realizing he wanted to take her on that. She remembered what he was. Nazi. Thief. Murderer. Pierce’s man, no matter how he felt about her. If she got on that quinjet, she would disappear and never be found again. She had to struggle. Fight, she told her limbs. Darcy tried to pull her arm away. She yanked with all her weight, but she was barefoot and clad only in soft pajama pants and a t-shirt. The rough surface of the roof cut her feet.

“Darcy,” Brock growled, “we’re going.” He scooped her up and began carrying her to the quinjet. He tried to soothe her again, calm her.

Darcy looked around wildly and did the only thing she could think of. She screamed.

 

***

 

Frank cut through a few of the mercenaries easily before he noticed something odd: everyone had been drawn away from medical part of the compound. It set off alarms in his mind and he doubled back, headed for Darcy. That was when he heard her.

Somewhere above him, Darcy was screaming for Thor.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter mood/title inspiration: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZOmN4pNu4A
> 
> That's a rough reveal, isn't it?


	10. Is It Wrong?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for your comments and kudos!

“Rumlow! Rumlow!” Frank bellowed up into the dark. It was a gutteral sound from somewhere deep in his belly. It startled and frightened some of the nearest SHIELD agents aiming their guns at the invaders. Most had never heard that kind of Alpha-rage up close and flinched. Their first instinct was to freeze, make themselves small, hide from that terrifyingly angry voice and hope it passed them without seeing. One of the agents understood what was happening immediately.

“It’s Brock Rumlow attacking us,” Sharon Carter signalled over her comms, opening her line so that Steve could hear Castle in the distance. She was linked to the quinjet returning from the aborted trip to Africa. They’d turned around over the Atlantic and sent word to the Dora Milaje that it might be a trap. The Dora Milaje persisted; they were waiting for Klaue anyway.

“We have to get back there,” Natasha sat, looking at Steve.

“Shit, Cap,” Sam Wilson said. “You want me to try to go back faster with my wings? I might be able to carry Wanda, she’s light.”

“Too much risk you’d run into their quinjet leaving and be in danger with a low power source,” Steve said. “Frank was right.” Steve’s voice was grim. “Rumlow diverted us purposefully.”

“I do not think he will actually hurt her, Steve,” Nat said.

“What would he do, then?” Steve asked seriously. Natasha didn’t reply immediately. He looked at their flight trajectory arching across one of the quinjet’s screens, then at Nat. “I’m not kidding, Romanoff. It wasn’t a rhetorical question.”

“Put her somewhere we’d never find her,” Natasha said. “Hide her. Provided Frank Castle hasn’t already killed him.”

“He hasn’t yet,” Steve said. Over his comms, through all the chaos, he could still hear Frank screaming for Rumlow in a terrifying rage.

 

***

 

Some ten feet away, Jack Rollins tilted his head, hearing Frank Castle. “Move out now!” he yelled over comms. “Fall back!” A distracted Castle meant the teams could safely transport their stolen goods without interference. The stolen goods--guns, servers, supernatural weapons--gleamed in the dark of the quinjet bays and vans. Jack smiled his feral smile at his loot and radioed Brock’s quinjet. That Castle had run straight to Darcy was a boon for him and the thieves, but Jack feared for Brock. They needed to start moving. He wanted to be in the air, in case Brock needed backup and air support. The quinjets and vehicles began fleeing, carefully masked by stealth tech.

 

“I hear engine sounds but I don’t see shit,” one agent said, carefully looking around as if invisible mercs might reveal themselves at any moment. “What the hell do we do?” he said.

“We think they’re fleeing. Secure the buildings and send a team to check on Darcy Lewis in medical,” Sharon Carter said clearly on the open line. “She’s the target. Captain’s orders.”

 

Cameron Klein, half-terrified of what might happen, pushed open a door in the main building. He had taken the earbud of the injured senior field agent he was dragging with him. “I’m going to get you to medical, Harper, I know the unlock codes. Then I’m going to find Darcy Lewis,” he said seriously.

“You’re gonna get killed, kid,” Harper said. He was bleeding from several gunshot wounds.

“No, sir,” Cameron said, moving them forward carefully, hunched low enough that he hoped they’d not get shot anymore. He was creeping along with someone loomed out of the dark and Cameron had to suppress a scream. It was Jane Foster. “Dr. Foster, thank God,” Cameron said, relieved.

“I need to get to Darcy in medical,” she said. “I can’t find Thor.”

“Take my gun,” Harper said. “I can’t hold up my firing arm at the moment.” Harper’s arm hung limply at his side. He was using his one good arm to hang onto Cameron. Jane looked at Cameron.

“I’m not a good shot,” he told her honestly. Jane took the gun from Harper’s waist holster. “I saw Thor ten minutes ago, but I don’t know where he is now,” Cameron said. His voice was mournful.

“It’s goddamn chaos, kid, you’re not responsible,” Harper said, trying with all his might to put one foot in front of the other as they began to move forward. He was four months from a pleasant retirement in Georgia. He wasn’t going to die in this cheap Bermuda grass at an unsecurable facility SHIELD had had to rent because the current Congress was dicking them around with federal funding, if he could help it. Also, he wanted to live long enough to testify that Senator Yarmouth was a fucking dipshit at the future Senate hearing. To his face, if he was lucky enough, Harper thought, praying he would be.

The bleeding man, the tech, and the scientist headed towards medical.

 

***

 

Darcy could distantly hear Frank screaming, but the logical side of her brain had stuttered to a stop when Rumlow lowered his mouth on hers to stop her from yelling for Thor. He stepped on quinjet with her in his arms and hit the door close button. The ramp doors were closing when there was a terrifying sound on the far side of the roof and Darcy and Brock turned to look. Frank Castle was roaring. He’d scaled the windows and gables and was now bodily dragging himself onto the roof, breathing heavily. It was the disconnected, frightening pant of an animal, not a human being. Frank was bloody and snarling, rifle in hand, some twenty feet away.

In response, Brock snarled back and tensed, drawing a gun to fire at Castle through the gap in the closing door. The gunshots seemed impossibly loud. She heard Castle roar again and knew at least one shot had landed. Darcy, acting on terrified instinct, tried to scramble out of Brock’s arms to run in the opposite direction from both of them. Some primitive part of her told to run, to flee. _This was not safe. Not safe. Run run run runrunrunrun,_ her brain said, springing to life in a haze of panic and adrenaline. Darcy would have leaped to her death from an in-flight quinjet in that moment, purely out of biological terror. She did not want to be anywhere in the vicinity of a fight between two enraged Alphas.

She began to flail wildly, making panicked, high-pitched screeches of fear. In response, Castle made a deep, guttural sound from the roof that made Darcy even more terrified. She scratched and clawed at Brock, but he didn’t react, even though she had drawn blood.

“S’okay, baby,” Brock said, tightening his grip on her until it was like iron and firing some final rounds at Castle. “S’okay, you’re safe.” The doors sealed shut with a clang and he continued to make soothing sounds at her, to make her feel calm. Darcy was shaking like a leaf, but he rocked her and began to nuzzle at her neck until her heart rate had returned to normal. As the sounds of gunfire and yelling faded and her adrenaline seeped away, Darcy leaned against him.

***

Below them, Frank continued to roar. “Rumlow!” Frank screamed, as the quinjet rose into the sky. “Rumlow!” Frank rose, still panting, and ran across the roof. Before his eyes, the quinjet vanished.

He screamed the other man’s name so loudly that it drew the attention of Jane and Cameron, half-dragging the injured man towards the building. “Darcy,” Jane said, horrified.

“What does that mean?” Cameron said, fighting against the instinctive urge to run from Frank's voice.

“Rumlow is here for her,” Jane said. “This is Rumlow.”

“Oh God,” Cameron said.

 

***

 

On the quinjet it was very quiet. Only three people were on board: Brock, Darcy, and the pilot. The other vehicles and quinjets, led by Jack, were headed elsewhere. They were taking the stolen goods overseas, to unknown HYDRA bunkers, banks, and warehouses in far-flung locations. The items were to be separated. Only Brock and Jack knew the location of each piece. Jack had already placed the warning call to Klaue, so he could flee the Wakandans. “Your boss going to sell his new goodies to me, mate?” Klaue had cackled to Jack in his South African accent. “I think I’m owed a share for inconvenience. He broke our little date.”

“You’ll have to take it up with him, Ulysses,” Jack said smoothly, before he hung up. Brock was planning a black market auction once news of the thefts emerged. Push the prices higher. Time and rumor would do some of the work for them; people like Klaue were as greedy as they were clever. The items would be worth more, once the rumor mill kicked in. Meanwhile, Jack would pay the team well and everyone would take a nice vacation. Beginning with the couple on the quinjet.

 

“You okay, baby?” Brock said, stroking the side of Darcy’s face. Her head was against his neck and she felt dizzy. Dizzy from the boozy intensity of his familiar scent--sweet amaretti--dizzy from shock--dizzy from the medication’s impact on her mind and body-dizzy from the jolt of absolute fear she’d experienced when in the presence of two territorial Alphas and her failed efforts at fleeing.

“Mmmm,” Darcy muttered, feeling oddly boneless in his arms. She could just sink down into his arms and sleep. Rest. Rest until she felt better, her Alpha-scent befuddled mind suggested. It was an appealing suggestion, this doing nothing. To fight would require her to open her eyes, do things. Why do anything at all? Just let her Alpha care of it. He had taken such good care of her before—a nagging part of Darcy’s brain prodded at her to question his actual beliefs, his absence, the reasons why there was a before and an after at all—but she was too tired to chase the thought. It rolled away into the recesses of her drowsy mind.

“We’ll be in the back,” Brock told the pilot.

“Still Trapani?” the pilot said. Brock nodded.

“Have the boat waiting for us,” Brock said, turning with Darcy towards another section of the quinjet. “She needs rest.” She was exhausted, he could feel. Darcy was practically unconscious. He tried to suppress the rage he felt at the bruises on her neck as he walked. He didn’t want to wake her with his intense feelings. Darcy shifted slightly when he eased her on the bed in the quinjet’s tiny separate room. “Do you want me to leave you?” he asked quietly. “I don’t want to leave, if you’re tired….” He let the sentence trail off. Darcy opened her eyes a fraction.

“Brock,” she said sleepily. “You came back. You came back.”

“I did, baby. I never should have left. I’m sorry,” Brock said. “You feel okay?” He had left her out of a misguided fear she would reject him because of his horrific appearance. He should have trusted his wife’s nature better, her tenderness. He touched her face gently.

“I feel so tired. The stuff made me dizzy,” she said.

“The stuff in the syringe?” he asked carefully. He had no idea what it was.

“Emergency suppressants,” Darcy slurred sleepily. “From Jane.”

“Good,” he said. “Good Jane.” Her eyes fluttered shut again. He didn’t want to rush her. He needed to get her adjusted to things slowly, carefully. She would be grief-stricken when she realized that she and Jane’s paths had diverged, he knew. But it was the natural way of bonds, pair bonds overriding other social relationships. Spouses were for one another. Now that he was free of Pierce’s control, they could be what he’d wanted them to be before: only for each other. He would be patient, woo her all over again. He could do it more honestly this time. In time...in time, everything would be all right: she would be his full partner in home and work, they would have children, and he would ease those children into respectable, legal work with his power and influence. In his fantasies, he’d imagined fleeing Pierce’s control once, but only the fall of HYDRA had given him the opportunity. And now he had the wealth to give her anything she could want or need. It was the stuff of his dreams and he’d only had to sacrifice his face. A small sacrifice, he realized now. He got a blanket from the closet--she tended to be cold--and draped it over her. Brock stepped away for a moment.

 

While Darcy slept, Brock bandaged his bleeding scratches, placed calls to Jack, and checked on the status of things. Everyone was going according to plan. The lack of complications meant he had nothing pressing to do. Even the Italian government appeared to be complying with his wishes, thankful for his bribes. The two of them would be undisturbed in their new home.

Joining Darcy in the bed, he eased her into his arms. She stirred briefly, then huffed into his neck. With her asleep, Brock quietly brooded. Castle had touched her. Castle was clearly some disgusting idea of Fury’s to lure him out, he thought bitterly, from the way Castle taunted him and then left Darcy vulnerable. So vulnerable. He stroked her dark hair, listening to her gentle breathing. That made him angriest of all. He had thought his plan would work, but seeing it work had unlocked a wave of rage within him. His wife. His wife, put under the aegis of a damaged, broken Alpha like Frank Castle. An Alpha who couldn’t even protect his own wife and children when the time came. Easily baited and led away from Darcy, despite his outward bravado.

Rumlow had known many men like Castle in the military. The fast-talkers, the hot-tempered, immature braggarts who could inflict pain, certainly--they were the boys who used their training to beat each other up in bars, grope strippers, raise hell, even harm civilians for the fun of it, so they were skilled at violence--but could they protect anyone? Of course not. When it came time to do something, you left men like that back at base when you could. Too much likelihood they’d wreck your whole plan with some ego-fueled act of violence towards an Afghan or Iraqi local whose influence you needed. In one way, Castle was a deviation: he’d actually lived. Usually, Alphas like that ran away from their families, killed themselves in DUIs, or did dumb shit in training, and left behind a struggling Omega and children. A crushing mortgage debt, a few sad kids, and a pair of dog tags, that should have been Castle’s legacy. Instead, his family had paid, somehow.

He’d found HYDRA rumors that the Castles were killed because Castle was suspected of turning on his Afghan death squad’s drug ring, which meant Castle had utterly failed to protect them. Failed. Castle seemed to get decent people all around him killed or nearly so: wife, children, military friends, federal agents, even that pretty journalist Omega he secretly kept in New York. Jack had found FBI surveillance photos of Karen Page and then realized the bearded man in a few images was Castle, not a random homeless man, that Page spoke to. She would make excellent leverage, if necessary.

Castle had the gall to try to claim Darcy. The fucking gall, Brock thought, to think his violence wouldn’t touch her, that he was worthy of her. Rumlow had contempt for men like Frank Castle. No inner order, only outer chaos and rage. Damaged goods. A man like Castle, Rumlow thought, was as harmful as a rabid dog wandering down your street. And Fury had attempted to install a rabid dog in his wife’s house. _His_ wife. He was already making Fury pay, embarrassing him with the SHIELD thefts, but if Frank Castle made a move, Rumlow fully intended to put the dog down. Darcy would be protected from anymore of this. He had stepped away once, but that was over. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title/mood inspiration: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SiyTs5pe5w
> 
> A supercut of Frank Castle just screaming and breathing frighteningly--it's a whole thing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WnPgSqFEmr8


	11. Yes To Heaven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for your comments and kudos!

“Frank!” a voice yelled behind him. Dimly, Frank turned, the haze of anger retreating. Jane was standing in the doorway, looking pale and furious. “Did he--did he?” she asked. He could see her shaking with rage.

“She’s gone,” Frank said. “She’s fucking gone.” He began to hit the nearest wall, screaming, until Jane tried to pull his bleeding knuckles away from the concrete. He was breathing heavily and ignored her. She slapped the back of his head and he turned, snorting. Something red bubbled out of his nose.

“You’ve been shot,” she told him. He looked at her with a dazed expression and she yanked on his elbow, muttering swear words. She dragged him to the elevator, towards medical, wondering when everything had gone so horribly, horribly wrong.  _I should have insisted on Steve,_ Jane thought. She was recriminating herself for stupidity when Frank blinked at her in the elevator. She couldn't tell where the blood was his or someone else's.

"I'm gonna get her back," he said hoarsely. "Gonna get her back." Jane didn't say anything. Her mind was on Heimdall.

 

***

 

“I can’t believe this happened,” a dejected Cameron Klein said to Sharon Carter. He was sitting in a plastic chair in a waiting area of the medical center. He still had some of Harper’s blood on his shirt. Jane had  brought Frank down to this floor and gone to find Thor. Harper was resting at a DC hospital; the SHIELD physician on-duty had luckily been uninjured and able to treat him before he was moved. “What do we do now, Shar?”

“I don’t know,” she admitted. The stolen goods they could get back, but Sharon had been puzzling over the agency’s right to get Darcy back. When she had been briefly SHIELD’s interagency consultant at the CIA, she’d discovered that Omega rendition was legally a gray area. It wasn’t covered by the Geneva Convention and--despite the best efforts of human rights’ activists--many governments turned a blind eye when an Alpha forcibly took their Omega. The Omegas were their property, after all. Sharon clenched her fist instinctively. If Brock Rumlow had been canny enough to stash her with a government that still legally used Omega couverture laws, they might be breaking laws to get her back. Not that Steve wouldn’t. Steve and Thor wouldn’t care about the bureaucracy, she thought, reassured. They’d do what was right.

 

***

 

By the time Steve and the Avengers arrived, Darcy was gone, the injured were being treated, and an inventory was being made of the stolen items and casualties. There were many stolen things, but thankfully, minimal casualties. The raid had been quick. “I’m sorry,” Steve told a pale and frighteningly angry Jane. “We’ll find her. Where’s Frank?”

“In there,” Jane said, indicating one of the medical exam rooms. “I had to drag him downstairs, even though he was shot three times, Steve. It was terrifying. I’ve never heard anything like that.”

“Yeah,” Steve said.

 

Steve knocked at the door and heard Frank called out. “Yeah?” a voice said. Steve opened the door. A shirtless, bandaged Frank was sitting on an exam table, staring at his bruised, battered fingers. He hadn’t really let them treat him, beyond digging out the bullets and taping up the wounds. He was grim-looking.

“Frank, I want to apologize to you,” Steve said quietly.

“You want to apologize to me, Cap?” Frank scoffed, looking up sharply.

“I didn’t listen to you when you suggested this was a diversion,” Steve said. “I should have left more people behind, called in Tony, done more.” Frank shook his head.

“Don’t tell me you’re beating yourself up, Cap. You didn’t leave her alone, I did. Goddammit. Goddammit!” Frank yelled in frustration, furiously smacking the exam table. “I got played by the fucking Nazi, Cap. That shit--that shit--I’m gonna get her back, you understand? She’s coming back.” Steve looked at Frank.

“I believe you,” he said.

“Yeah, well, you fucking better,” Frank said.

“I want you on my team,” Steve said quietly. “I think we need your skill set.”

 

“Took you long enough,” Nat said, when Steve emerged from the exam room. “That was practically on 1945 time, Cap.”

“You just like giving me a hard time, Romanoff,” Steve said. “I need to put a team on possible locations, I called Tony and asked him to use his AI to see where Rumlow might’ve bought property through shell companies.”

“I want to see how he was when he took her,” Natasha mused out loud. “Aggressive? Violent?”

“What?” a voice said behind them. Frank was standing in the hallway, arms crossed over his gunshot wounds. “What did you say?”

“Would you like to review the tapes with us?” Natasha asked.

 

***

 

When Darcy woke up, there was sunlight streaming through a balcony window. She had a faint memory of landing at an airport and then being carried onto a boat by Brock. She sat up, got her glasses off the nightstand, and then looked around. She was in a large room with an old wrought-iron bed, tile floors, and plaster walls. There was a small dining table and a dresser. Opposite her bed, there was a balcony, framed by thin curtains. She moved to the balcony doors and looked out. The house or apartment was high in elevation. Below, there was a beautiful harbor. Boats bobbed on a turquoise sea. “Pretty, right?” a voice said behind her. Darcy turned. Brock was standing in the doorway, dressed in a t-shirt and jeans. His feet were bare. “Got you coffee, baby,” he said, walking over to stand behind her and passing her a cup of coffee.

“Where are we?” Darcy asked. He opened the doors, smiling.

“You see that?” he asked, pointing to a hazy outline in the distance. “Sicily. That’s Trapani, where my family is from. We’re on an island called Levanzo, baby.”

“Where we always talked about going,” Darcy said flatly.

“Yeah,” he said, his voice excited. “You remembered?” He kissed the side of her head. “We’re gonna do everything we said we’d do. I’m gonna make it all up to you.”

“You want to make it all up to me?” Darcy repeated. She set her coffee on the table and looked out at the sea.

“Yeah, sweetheart,” he said, “I’m going to fix everything, okay? You’ll be safe here and you can rest. You still tired? You slept for twelve hours or so.”

“Oh,” Darcy said, “yeah. I feel sleepy. Can we go outside?”

“Not yet, okay? Wait a few days, I’ll take you on a sail,” he said, twining his fingers through her hair. “We can go to the main house in Trapani when everything calms down. I’ll get you some food,” he said. “Bathroom’s right through there. You feel like having some breakfast and then a bath or a nap with your old man?”

“You wanna take a bath with me?” Darcy asked. “I thought...” she said.

“What, baby?” He stroked her hair soothingly.

“I thought it was pretend, that you’d made it all up to be near Jane,” Darcy said, her voice hitching.

“No, no,” he said, pulling her close with one arm.

“I saw Pierce’s files!” she said, crying a little. She was hysterical, he thought. Still tired and hysterical.

“Oh, Darcy, baby, you gotta know, it was always you. Always. From that first week we spent together, I just wanted to be with you. There was just no way to get out from under Pierce and keep you safe,” he said. "He would have killed you had he known how attached I was to you."

“Bullshit, you left me for a year!” she yelled. “Pierce was dead and you still left!”

“You asked me for a divorce, I was hurt,” he said. He sounded defensive. “I thought you didn’t want me when I was like this,” he said.

“You think I only cared about your looks? What about all the things you did?” Darcy said.

“My back was against the wall with HYDRA, baby, but I’m not that anymore,” he said, trying to soothe her. "I don't care about HYDRA. That's all in the past."

“What are you now?” she said.

“I’m only for you. Only for you,” he said. “I just want to give you all the good things I couldn’t before, okay? Give us a good life together.”

“As fugitives?” she said.

“We won’t always be fugitives, I’ve got a plan,” he said. “Long term.”

“Okay,” she repeated, sniffling.

“Okay?” he said, holding her. He would keep holding her, until the feelings of anxiety went away.

 

A few minutes later, there was a knock at the door. “Boss?” a voice said. He looked up from where he’d been holding Darcy. Her eyes were focused on the window, but she was calm now.

“What?” Rumlow said sharply. “I told you I wasn’t to be disturbed.”

“It’s Klaue and several other dealers,” the voice said. Darcy could hear the anxiety threaded through his tone. “The phone won’t stop ringing, sir.”

“Go,” Darcy said, rubbing his arm. “I’ll run my bath.”

“You’re too good to me,” he said in a heated voice. “So understanding.” He captured her chin with his scarred fingers and kissed her lightly.

 

***

 

When Brock came back, she was already in the bath. She looked like a dream, he thought. So beautiful. It seemed impossible that she’d returned to him. She sat up with a slosh. “Everything okay?” she asked quietly. Those eyes watched him carefully.

“Yeah, it’s just business being business, nothing for you to worry about,” he said. He got a comb from the sink and started combing her hair. She hmm’d in response and his chest tightened. “I love you,” he told her in her in a low, serious voice. He’d missed that sound and he hadn’t even known.

“There’s something I want,” Darcy said suddenly. He stopped detangling her hair.

“Yeah? Name it,” Brock said. He would give her anything she wanted.

“I want to bond with you again,” she whispered. “I need that to feel okay, I need the bond back to anchor me.”

“You want that?” he said, delighted. He smiled, then grimaced as he thought about logistics. He had meetings about the SHIELD tech already. “Now’s a difficult time for you to go into cycle, baby. I feel better with security around you right now.” His security was all-Alpha, mostly. Also, he didn’t want anyone to catch him off-guard. He would be vulnerable if they took a week without security to be alone. Something could happen to her. She looked at him with those big sea-blue eyes. “Soon,” he said, kissing her forehead. “In the meantime, I’ll get you more suppressants, okay?” She nodded.

 

***

The Avengers were in a planning meeting. “According to Tony’s AI,” Maria Hill said, “we have five to six probable locations, purchased by shell companies. Two houses in the Caribbean, two in Europe, and one in Bali.”

“Bali?” Sam Wilson said, perplexed.

“It is beautiful,” Natasha said. "He would want to take her somewhere pleasant, I think?"

“Wouldn’t he stand out, though?” Sam said.

“He would stand out everywhere,” Wanda said reasonably. They'd all seen the tapes. 

“The burned guy still likes sunshine, big fucking deal,” Frank said, cutting off their debate. He’d been irritable and frustrated during the briefing. Ever since he’d seen the tape of Rumlow leading Darcy out by the hand practically, he’d been angry. He’d heard the other man use Alpha voice on a terrified woman with only a useless taser. He'd heard her no. Before he used the tone, she had clearly said no. She didn't want him, Frank thought, it was just the bond pulling them together, overriding her own feelings. He realized his mistake now. Frank blamed himself: he'd pushed too hard, taunted Rumlow into action, when he should have waited, waited until he'd cemented his own bond with Darcy to give her an extra layer of protection. He'd pushed forward, like a moron, and fucked it all up. Everyone had been confident that Thor could instantly track her down with some Asgardian motherfucker, but it had turned out she'd vanished with the stolen quinjet. It was like Darcy had been wiped off the map. Frank tried not to think about what that meant. Had Rumlow put her in a dark hole someplace? The anxiety rolled off him in waves. At his feet, Dog sat up and leaned his grey head against Frank’s leg. His tail _thump-thumped_ against the table. The pit bull had an almost human habit of wrinkling his forehead when he sensed Frank’s stress. Frank patted the dog quietly and then looked at everyone. “When do we fucking move?” he said. “I hate all this sitting around.”

 “We need to figure out which of these places is most likely,” Maria Hill said, tapping her tablet so the screen showed the dots on a global map. She’d been trying not to recoil or show fear at Frank’s hostile energy. Frank sat up abruptly.

“It’s that one,” he said, pointing, “a hundred bucks says he took her to fucking Italy.”

“You think so?” Maria said. She moved her glance around the room. Natasha nodded fractionally, Thor more vigorously.

“The man’s crazy about his Italian bullshit--” Frank began, before Steve cut him off. Captain America had leaned forward to look at the map.

“Trapani. Jane said that’s where his family was from, right?” Steve said to Thor.

“Aye,” Thor said.  

“It’s a personal location for him. The rest of them aren’t personal,” Steve said.

“No shit, Cap. This is personal for him,” Frank said.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title/mood inspiration: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jcrEnvyw-Pw
> 
> Levanzo is very beautiful: https://italia-by-natalia.pl/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/DSC00532.jpg
> 
> Views by drone: https://youtu.be/vLqI6GryAWI


	12. Flipside

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for your comments and kudos!

Darcy and Brock spent the rest of the week together, mostly in bed. Cuddling, talking, kissing. “I never thought I would have this again,” he told her, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

“I didn’t, either,” she said quietly. She looked troubled. “About Castle--it wasn’t my idea. Please don’t be angry,” she said.

“I could never be angry with you. Never,” he said, cupping her face with his scarred hand. He sighed. “I don’t want to leave you next week.”

“You have a meeting with Klaue?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he said. “But I’ll leave Jack here with you. Jack and probably Thad.” Thad was one of the young German mercs. A Beta. He could trust a Beta not to touch Darcy. He could trust Jack with anything. Darcy sat up, frowning. He could feel her anxiety edging up. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

“I’m worried about you not having Jack for protection. Jack _cares_ about what happens to you. These new guys--” she murmured, biting her lip. “Klaue is dangerous and the things you have are valuable. They could betray us.”

“Are you worried about me?” he said, smiling so widely he felt his scars pull.

“Don’t laugh at me,” she said. “You’re all I have. You have a responsibility to stay safe for me.” She pushed his hair back.

“Oh, I do?” he said. Her concern made him feel warm. He’d missed that, too.

“Mmm-hmm,” she said, kissing him. She pulled back and looked into his scarred eyes. “What would happen to me if something happened to you?” she asked. He felt his jaw go tight. He had no contingency plan for another near-death experience. With the people he worked with, a widow who inherited the stolen goods was a target….He swallowed.

“Okay,” he said. “I’ll put some things in a safety deposit box in Trapani. If something happens to me, I want you to be able to get to safe location, all right?”

“You’re going to take Jack?” she asked.

“Of course,” he said. He sighed. “I hadn’t even thought about that.” He stared at the ceiling, then stroked her hair.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, rubbing his shoulders.

“I need to get out of this,” he said. “Or you and our children will be targets.”

“Get out of your work?” she said.

“I’ll need to make these auctions count,” he said, frowning.

 

***

 

Brock had gone to take a phone call and Darcy was sitting in a small room upstairs that he had outfitted for her when there was a knock. “Darce?” Jack Rollins said.

“Hi, Jack,” she said, sitting up and peering over the couch back at him. She’d been reading and drinking coffee and eating chocolate. She looked well, he thought. Stronger and healthier in Rumlow’s presence. He had a shine, too. Bonded pairs stayed healthier together. Brock had mentioned that she was already asking about reaffirming the bond and he was worried about safety and logistics. Jack was relieved he was thinking it through; if he’d wanted to knot with her immediately, they’d have to postpone all the auctions and deals. This morning Rumlow had come downstairs determined to max out their bidding, for reasons he hadn’t clarified.

“You look happy,” he told her.

“I am! This is a new book on Sicily,” she said. “It’s pretty good and I like this chocolate, too. Where’s it from?”

“Uh, a place in Florence, I think?” Jack said. He didn’t tell her that Rumlow was having new rings made by a Florentine jeweler. That was supposed to be a surprise. Jack frowned. He hadn’t expected her to be so happy. What if this was a mistake? Maybe he should say nothing?

“What is it?” Darcy said. “Nothing’s wrong with Brock?”

“No, no. I just wanted to tell you something,” Jack said. He raked a hand through his hair. “This is about Frank Castle.”

“Oh,” she said. “I don’t really want to talk about him. It might upset Brock.”

“How do you feel about him?” Jack asked. She shrugged.

“It was Fury’s idea. Frank was my neighbor and when SHIELD found out who he was because of some Irish mafia, they kinda pressured him into baiting Brock,” she said, frowning. “It was all staged. He still loves his wife. She died, you know?”

“Irish mafia?” Jack said. Darcy looked at him nervously.

“He killed them in my hallway and Fury showed up,” Darcy said. “Things---”

“Escalated, love?” Jack offered.

“Mmm-hmm,” she said, nodding.

“I see,” he said. “I don’t think you need to see this, then.”

“What is it?” she said, wide-eyed. Jack opened the manila envelope and slid out the glossy photos.

“He keeps an Omega in New York,” Jack said. “If he’s told you he’ll be faithful--”

“No,” Darcy said, looking at them. “She’s a very pretty blonde, but it really has nothing to do with me. I barely know Castle.” She handed them back to Jack.

“Good,” Jack said. “I’m glad.” He smiled at her. “Brock loves you more than I’ve ever seen him love anyone,” he told her. Darcy’s expression went thoughtful and she bit her lip.

“I’m trusting you to take care of him at these meetings when I can’t be there, Jack,” she told him. “Someone needs to protect him.”

“You think you could protect him from Klaue?” Jack teased.

“Let Klaue try with me,” she sassed back. Jack laughed.

 

As he walked back downstairs to join the meeting, he wondered why he’d worried. They were besotted with each other. Darcy in particular. She adored Brock. She always had. Still looked at him like he hung the moon, even with his present face.

  


***

 

Brock left Darcy with Thad one morning. He was taking the boat into Trapani to go to the airport and had sent the rest of the guys ahead, so they could have more privacy. Holding her in the doorway of the house, he kissed her forehead. “Be safe,” she told him, looking up into the dark aviators he wore when going out in public. They were standing just inside, in the shadows, but the light outside was bright and sunny.

“I will,” he said. “I’ll be back to you soon, okay? This’ll take some time, but we’re going to have fun afterwards. Maybe go to Venice?” he said to her.

“I’d love Venice,” she said sighing and burying her face in his neck. She nuzzled him, smelling his cookie-sweet scent, then leaned up to whisper in his ear. “You better have left me a dirty t-shirt to sleep in, hubby.”

“You bet,” he said, kissing her cheek, then her nose, and finally, her mouth.

“It would be nice to have a house by ourselves,” she said, idly running her fingers in his hair.

“Mmm-hmm. I’ll put it on my list,” he said. He brushed his mouth against her forehead.

“Just me and you?” she said.

“You and me,” he said, rocking her a little in his hug. “A couple kids? Maybe Jack would like to nanny?”

“I want to see his face when you tell him that,” she said, giggling.

 

***

 

Alone, Darcy made an effort to befriend Thad. It must have worked. He brought her back gelato from a cart she could see from the window. The people on the beaches looked happy, she thought. Like a dream.

 

The SHIELD team raided the Trapani house a few days later. Darcy saw the quinjet from Levanzo. She was standing at the balcony window. Brock was somewhere in Ghana, bargaining with Ulysses Klaue and prepping for the auctions. Thad was downstairs. She pulled a chair to the window and waited with a book. “Everything all right?” Thad said, some twenty minutes later, opening the door.

“Yes,” Darcy said, looking up. “Has my husband called?”

“No, madam,” Thad said formally. He looked nervous. “You should stay away from windows.”

“Really? Why?” Darcy asked. He swallowed.

“Uh, uh, is situation on Sicily. Volcano,” he said.

“Oooooh,” Darcy said. “Is that what the big plume of smoke is?”

“Yes,” he said, nodding assiduously. “Please step away from the window. For safety.”

 

***

 

“Nobody here!” Cap called over comma. They were raiding Rumlow’s Sicilian mansion. So far, they’d only found employees. In the corner, Frank was shaking one and cursing him in another language. “Frank,” Steve said seriously.

“He is speaking Sicilian,” Thor said cheerfully. He had another merc pinned with the hammer.

“Motherfucker,” Frank said, dropping the merc.

“What happened?” Nat asked over comms.

“He peed himself,” Steve said. “No sign of Rumlow or Darcy.” He sighed.

  


They left Italy and began raiding Rumlow’s other properties. But they couldn’t find Darcy.

  


***

 

On Levanzo, Darcy talked to Brock every few days, spent time reading, and finally convinced Thad to let her walk along the shore. Brock told him to let her do whatever she wanted. So, they wandered down to the touristy part of the island and got gelato from a cart. As they strolled, Darcy stopped to talk to people, take photos, and admire the views. When they got nearer to the water, she spotted the small rowboats for rent. “Oooh, can we take a boat ride?” she asked Thad. He looked at her dubiously.

“Is very small boat,” he said.

“We’ll stay near the shoreline,” she said cheerfully. “What do you say?”

“All right,” he said. He was afraid Crossbones would be angry if she became unhappy. They rented the little boat.

“This is so cute!” she said. He rowed her around the corner of the island’s shoreline. “Look at that view!” Darcy said, pointing.

  


Thad woke up on the shoreline, coughing. He vaguely remembered standing up a fraction to see the view towards Sicily and then---nothing. He sat up. The little boat was bobbing some twenty feet away. “Madam Rumlow!” he yelled. “Madam Rumlow!”  

There was no response. He ran into the water and began to paddle wildly. When he finally got to the boat, he grabbed the side and looked in.

It was empty.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title/mood inspo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYi4ajAnAyY


	13. God Knows I Tried/Tomorrow Never Came

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing! Thanks for all your comments and kudos! The following on this story has been so intense, y'all are awesome.

With every house they raided without finding her, Frank’s rage grew. Steve started to fear that his anger was literally too much for his body. He offered to box with Frank, just to give him something to do to burn some of it off. It wasn’t like Steve dented easily. Dog the pit bull followed them into the gym and settled on the floor as they climbed into the ring one evening.

“You ready?” Frank said.

“Could do this all day,” Steve said. They circled each other in the ring.

“You ever fuck up, Cap?” Frank asked, inhaling with a sniffle. They were both running a little angry these days, reeking of bitter, pissed off Alpha. His punch glanced off Steve’s jaw. _Clunk._ “I mean, really fuck up, not just forgetting to say _thank you ma’am_ or some shit?” he asked.

“Sure, plenty,” Steve said. “I notice you say _thank you ma’am_ some, Frank,” he added. Frank could be polite. Traditional. Even old-fashioned. _Thwack._ A fist connected with Frank’s torso and he swore vividly, moving out of Steve’s range. That was the trick to boxing: you had to get close enough to be vulnerable to land your own blows.

“Oh, yeah?” Frank said, raising his fists. “Tell me about that, Cap?”

“Let my best friend fall off a train, HYDRA got him, brainwashed him, and used him as a killer. That’s why I want Rumlow,” Steve said, dodging a blow.

“Your friend, huh?” Frank said disbelievingly. “Sure, Cap.” Steve’s evident surprise gave Frank time to clip his chin.

“Just what are you getting at, Frank?” Steve asked, shifting out of range and then moving in close again. “He’s still my friend. Still Bucky. I don’t care what anybody else says,” Steve said in a stubborn voice.

“I don’t mean that. I’m just skeptical about your platonic feelings, Cap,” Frank said, swinging hard.

“Excuse me?” Steve said, failing to dodge. Frank’s blow landed solidly.

“They’re bullshit. That’s your fucking boyfriend that Rumlow hurt, isn’t it?” Frank asked. Steve almost said no. He stuttered a little. “Uh-huh,” Frank said, tilting his head, “what’s that again? Boyfriend, Cap. You go to the pictures together? Sit in the dark?”

“Shut up, Frank,” Steve said, momentarily distracted by being in the present and 1941. He could still see the delight reflected across Bucky’s face in the dark.

“You ever think about kissing him at the pictures, Cap?” Frank said and Steve knocked him off his feet.

“Go to hell, Frank,” Steve said. “So what if I love him?” A coughing Frank looked up from the mat. His coughs turned to a smile.

“So what? So _everything,_ Cap. You just had a moment of realization: you love somebody. You gotta get him back. Once we get Darcy back,” Frank said. He sat up.

“He’s done a lot of bad things,” Steve said, swallowing. “It will be...complicated.” He sagged against the ropes for a moment, thinking.

“So fucking what?” Frank said. “Love ain’t always easy, Cap. You got a right to it, just like any other man. Maybe more. People can deal or they can go to hell.” He smirked. Steve shook his head.

“Frank, you’re an unusual person, you know that?” Steve said.

They were interrupted by an PA alert. Rumlow was looking for a German mercenary. “Cap,” Cameron Klein said over the building’s speakers, “you need to get down here. Right now. This is bad news.”

 

***

 

A few hours after Thad found the boat empty, some items floated to the shore: her sunglasses, a little wallet, a tube of lipgloss, a little rollerball of perfume. Darcy’s things. They were found by a fisherman, who took them to Crossbones’ men. “Thank you,” Jack Rollins said in Italian. They’d returned as soon as Thad called to say she was missing. Of course, Thad had fled the island on the ferry when he heard Rumlow over the phone. They had checked all the island’s ferries and the limited security cameras near the ferry entrance. She hadn’t fled. For a while Jack hoped she’d just had a moment of restlessness and had gone to Trapani as a lark. But there was no sign of her. Which meant she’d actually drowned. Jack looked sadly down at the scarf. He recognized it. One of her favorites. He carried it up to Brock carefully. When he opened the door to the bedroom, Brock half turned his head.

“You got news?” he asked. There was a bottle on his knee. He was sitting in her chair by the window.

“Fisherman found some of her things, mate,” Jack said. He laid them carefully on the table. Brock stared at them silently. Jack turned. When his hand was on the door handle, Brock spoke suddenly.

“‘S my fault,” Brock slurred, “she was never a strong swimmer. Always said--always said she was going to learn one day. I left her with that fucking moron, she didn’t know the current was strong on that side of the island. Wouldn’t have happened if I’d been there, Jack. But I got greedy. I was thinking about money. Fucking money’ll never bring her back.” He sounded weepy.

“Don’t give up yet,” Jack said.

“You found Thad yet?” Brock said, voice turning deadly.

“We’re looking,” Jack said.

“I want him dead, Jack. I need him to hurt. Somebody needs to hurt,” Brock said. “I want to make somebody hurt.”

“I know,” Jack said.

 

Brock Rumlow was sitting in the dark a few minutes later when it dawned on him that there was someone besides Thad who deserved to hurt. He stumbled to his feet. “Jack!” he yelled. “Jack!”

“Yeah, mate?” Jack asked.

“Pass a message through SHIELD channels. We’re doing the Nigeria job tomorrow,” he said.

“What?” Jack said.

“I’m going to finish it. Finish him. That’s when it all started. He ruined everything. Everything,” Brock repeated.

“Brock--” Jack began, not understanding.

“Just get it ready,” Rumlow said. Jack retreated at his look.

 

“I’ll take him with me and I’ll get to see her again,” he said to himself.

 

***

 

Frank was sitting with Dog at SHIELD headquarters. He’d found a quiet patio where he could be alone with his dog for a few minutes. “It’s not true,” Jane said, stepping outside with him. Cameron had called her, too, when the reports circulated that one of Rumlow’s German mercs had somehow gotten Darcy killed and then fled from an island near Trapani. She’d been there all the time. So close.

“You sure about that, Foster?” he said. “She was close enough to see us raiding the place in Trapani, you know that?” he said. “If she had a goddamn window in her prison.”

“If Darcy were dead, I would know. Thor’s gone to see Heimdall,” she said. Jane thought it might be a ruse. She said as much to Frank. “He’s trying to throw you off, shake you up,” she said. “Don’t let him.”

“Uh-huh,” Frank said. “I won’t.”

 

They were sitting in silence when Steve found them. “We’ve got another tip,” Steve announced. “Rumlow is going to steal a biochemical weapon in Nigeria. You ready?” he asked Frank.

“Yeah, sure, I’m ready,” Frank said, standing up. “Can I leave him with you?” he asked Jane, gesturing to Dog with the leash.

“Sure,” she said. “Don’t let Rumlow fuck with either of you,” she told both men. Steve nodded.

 

***

 

They were on the quinjet, en route to Nigeria, when a familiar face appeared on the quinjet screen. “Hola, Capsicle, what’s shakin?” Tony Stark said cheerfully.

“Tony, we’re on a mission,” Steve said seriously.

“Do you see how he treats me?” Tony said, speaking to someone off-screen. “It’s incredibly rude.” He turned his attention back to Steve. “Cap, you gotta see my new houseguest, we’re hanging out in Cannes, like you do,” Tony said. Steve sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose.

“I think I’m going to need a ride home, whenever your top secret thing is done,” a female voice said and Steve’s head jerked up. She was standing in front of a beaming Tony.

“Darcy?” he said. The words had barely gotten out of his mouth before he was slammed bodily. “Ouch, Frank,” Steve complained, more out of annoyance than pain. A dozing Frank had awoken and barreled towards the sound of her voice.

“Frank?” Darcy said. She looked suddenly nervous and tentative.

“Lewis?” he said. They looked at each other.

“Should we, uh, give them some privacy?” Tony said. “This feels like a moment. Who’s this guy again?”

“Tony, go,” Steve said, nodding at Darcy and walking backwards. The last thing he saw was Frank, smiling slowly up at the screen.

 

***

“You okay?” Frank asked her.

“Pretty much. I had to hide in the hills near the lighthouse to wait for Tony after I hit a German guy with an oar and borrowed a cell phone from a tourist,” Darcy said, “but the hardest part was pretending to still be in love with my crazy ex-husband.”

“Yeah?” Frank said. “You sure you were pretending?”

“Sometimes no, but mostly yes,” she said. “It was forty percent genuine, sixty percent fake.”

“Yeah,” he said, swallowing. “That’s good to know.”

“He might love me the best way he knows how, but I deserve better,” she said. “I never realized it before, but I do now.”

“Good,” Frank said, nodding.

“Also, when were you going to mention Karen?” she asked. “Were you going to mention Karen?”

“What?” Frank said.

“We should probably warn her, too,” Darcy said.

“He threatened Karen?” Frank said, puffing up a little.

“Ooooh, you do like her!” Darcy said.

“No, I mean, she’s a friend, okay? A good friend. She worked for my lawyer,” Frank said, looking slightly trapped.

“She’s an exceptionally pretty friend,” Darcy said wickedly.

“I don’t--I mean--” Frank stuttered.

“Uh-huh,” Darcy said.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” Frank said. "We're going to get him now."

“Frank,” Darcy said quietly. “If you can bring him in without killing him--”

“Yeah, Shortstack. I know. I'll try.”

 

***

 

The targeted institute in Lagos was near a bustling marketplace. They weren’t able to prevent Rumlow from breaking in and stealing the biochemical, but they chased the mercenaries and Crossbones through the streets. In the chaos, Frank went AWOL. “He’s got enhanced pain tolerance!” Natasha yelled, when her Widow’s Bites didn’t stun Rumlow as she expected and he was able to evade her.

“I want eyes on him!” Steve yelled. “Where are you, Frank? Don’t do anything radical, we need your backup!”

“I’m not going endanger your mission, Cap,” Frank said wryly over comms. No one knew exactly where he was. They could hear him breathing slowly over the earpieces. He’d calmed substantially since seeing Darcy, Steve realized. His rage seemed to have ebbed away.

 

Finally, Steve caught up with Rumlow. Their hand to hand-to-hand battle was violent, but brief. He was heavily armored, but Steve was still stronger. He had tossed Rumlow several feet and was advancing on him when Crossbones removed his mask. Steve got his first close look the man’s scarred face and recoiled. “This is for dropping a building on me,” he said. “I think I look pretty good, all things considered. I been through a lot.”

“Who’s your buyer?” Steve yelled.

“Doesn’t matter. She’s gone, Cap. She’s gone,” Rumlow said, panting. “I fucked up, Cap. I left her alone with a guy and she drowned. I wasn’t there. You know about that, don’t you? What that feels like? He knew we knew you. Your pal, your buddy, Bucky,” Rumlow said. His words were separated by deep, agonizing breaths. Ragged sounds. Steve froze.

“What?” Steve said.

“Before they put his brain back in the blender, he said, ‘tell Rogers, when you gotta go, you gotta go.’ I know what that means now, Cap, I really do,” Rumlow said. He smirked. “I wanna see her again. And you're coming with me--” Rumlow began, his face twisting monstrously. It was at that moment that Steve saw the explosives trigger in his hands. He couldn’t act quickly enough. But the boom he expected never came.

 

A fraction of a second later, there was a nearly-silent sensation close to Steve and Rumlow’s thumb fell away. Steve was momentarily confused, as Rumlow’s body drifted backwards. Crossbones came to rest on his back in the dirt, perfectly still. Steve looked down and saw the small, neat hole in the center of Brock Rumlow’s forehead. For a long moment, Steve looked into the burned face. He’d died with a smile on his face. Believing he’d see Darcy again, Steve realized, with a kind of sick pang. Then Steve looked around. On a distant roof, too far for even Steve to hear the bullets, Frank Castle had taken a sniper’s position.

 

“You’re welcome, Cap,” Frank said, voice blunt. He sighed.

“Thanks, Frank.”

“I’d have liked it better if I hadn’t had to. We gonna round up these assholes and get Barnes or you wanna buy one of those straw baskets?” Frank suggested. “I guess underwater basket weaving’s after your time, huh?”

“Underwater basket weaving?” Steve said. “I don’t--”

“He is trolling you. I have the biochemical,” Natasha said over comms.

“She’s very efficient, Cap, I think you should keep her around,” Frank said. Natasha told him to shut up in Russian.

 

***

 

_A week or so later_

 

New York City

 

There was a knock at Tony’s door. “Yello!” he said.

“Tony,” Steve said.

“Capsicle! Come in. You just caught me before I take Pep to Tahiti. What’s going on?” he said. “Itty Bitty okay?”

“Yeah, Tony, she is,” he said.

“What’s this new guy like?” Tony said curiously. “He decent? I can totally set her up--”

“Tony,” Steve said, holding up a hand. “There’s something I need to tell you. It’s--it’s difficult.” He swallowed. “It’s about Bucky Barnes.”

“Your childhood Rhodey who died?” Tony said, frowning.

“Not exactly,” Steve said, taking a deep breath.

“Whatever it is, Capsicle, we’ll figure it out,” Tony said.

“I don’t know if we will. Is Pepper here? It might be good if she was here when we talk about this. Bucky is--Bucky’s still alive. HYDRA had him, Tony,” Steve said. “In cryo. He escaped during the Uprising.”

“Sonofabitch, you’re kidding,” Tony said.

“No, I’m not,” Steve said. “It’s what they were doing with him. They brainwashed him, Tony, and were using him as an assassin called the Winter Soldier. Unfreezing him and freezing him again to extend his lifespan. He’s been serumed, too.  He didn’t know who he was. Didn’t know me. Wouldn’t have known his own family.” He sighed heavily. “I’ve been looking for him, but I’ve found out--”

“Found out what?” Tony said.

“He killed a lot of people, Tony.”

“Well, seventy years is a long time. Like who? Did he get Kennedy?” Tony asked.

“Oh Tony,” Steve said, looking up with something shining in his eyes, “I don’t know how to tell you--”

 

Tony sat back a fraction. He’d gone pale. “I see,” he said. “He wouldn’t have known you, so he wouldn’t have known Dad, either. And, of course, he never met Mom. She was too young.”

“I’m so sorry,” Steve whispered. “What do you want me to do?”

“I don’t know, Capsicle,” Tony said, looking at a spot along the wall. At that moment, Pepper walked in.

“Hi, Steve,” she began, “what’s wrong?”

“Why don’t you, uh, give us a minute, Cap?” Tony asked, a quaver in his voice. “I want to tell Pep and then we’ll talk.”

“Okay,” Steve said evenly. He got up and left quickly. But even with the door closed, he could still hear Tony weeping in Pepper’s arms.

 

***

 

Darcy had taken a new, more secure apartment in DC, at Jane’s insistence. She was going to be a real single girl now. Everyone had helped her move in, including Frank, despite his continual refrain that he ‘ought to be moving on soon.’ His actions in Nigeria had earned him another little covert pardon and a SHIELD job offer, but he didn’t think he was meant for a steady job. It was just the two of them and Dog when Darcy programmed her home security system. “What are you going to use?” Frank asked. Darcy looked down at Dog.

“What was my last guess? Pumpernickel? Bob?” she asked.

“Anatolia,” Frank said.

“Should I use that or are you going to give me his real name? Dog's too short,” Darcy asked. Frank rubbed his chin. He was silent for a moment.

“My kids wanted to call a dog Hershey, if we ever got one,” he said quietly. “Use that.”

“Thanks, Frank,” she said, hugging him. He sighed. They both held on for a moment. He smelled so nice, Darcy thought.

“Now that you know his real name, would you mind keeping him for me?” Frank said. “Just for a little while?”

“Sure,” she said.

“I’ll check in on him occasionally,” he said. “Send you money for the, uh, heartworm stuff, food, that kind of thing.”

“Yeah,” Darcy said. She walked him to the door. He knelt to pet Dog-slash-Hershey and then looked up at her.

“I’m glad you’re okay, Lewis,” he said. “I’m really sorry about--”

“Me, too,” she said softly. He grunted in acknowledgement.

“I better go,” he said, still looking at the pit bull.

“Take care, Frank. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do,” Darcy said.

“I think we’ve established that’s a pretty wide window, isn’t it?” Frank said, rising to smirk down at her.

“Shut up, wiseass. Go bug your other secret friend not-girlfriend,” she teased, swatting at him.

“I’m not--” he began, looking flustered.

“Sure,” Darcy teased. She watched Frank walk away and get on the elevator. He turned back to her and called out.

“Behave, Lewis!” he said, rubbing his close-shorn hair. She laughed at him.

 

She shut the door and looked around. Her apartment was neatly arranged. She was free and single, save one thing. Darcy called Thor and Jane’s. Jane answered on the first ring, alarmed. “What’s wrong?” she said.

“Nothing, Science Mama, I just need someone to watch Dog for me for a day or two,” Darcy said.

“Yes!” Thor boomed in the background.

“So, I have a dedicated pet-sitter? Frank left him with me for the foreseeable future,” she said.

“Frank left?” Jane said, sounding relieved.

“I thought you liked Frank?” Darcy said. Jane grumbled. “Okay, maybe like is a strong word,” Darcy said.

“I can tolerate him, I guess,” Jane admitted.

“Ha! I knew it.”

 

***

 

 

It was surprisingly sunny in New York when Tony’s car delivered Darcy to St. Raymond’s Cemetery in the Bronx. Tony was the only person Darcy had told about the real reason for her trip. He understood about loving people and hating their choices at the same time. She had instructions to meet Angela near the mausoleum. That was where he was going to be interred, near his father. She was carrying the box very carefully. She’d talked to Angela and had it all done in DC. Darcy hadn’t wanted Angela to see what he looked like. Let her remember her handsome, charismatic, affectionate son, not the man that Pierce had groomed him to be. Angela was standing in front of one of the niches. “Hello, honey,” she said, her brown eyes tearful. He'd gotten his eyes from his mother. “You brought him back to me?” 

“This is his father’s?” Darcy said.

“Johnny,” Angela said, touching the plate over the stone. Brock’s first name had been his mother’s invention. She’d wanted him to have something with flair, he’d once told Darcy. They sat down on one of the benches. Darcy gestured to the mahogany box in her lap.

“Did you want to see them?” she asked. Angela took it gently and opened it. Her tears increased

“You sure you don’t want some of them?” Angela asked.

“Do you think he’ll be able to rest better all in one place?” Darcy said. “This is very peaceful.”

“It is,” Angela said. She wiped away a tear.

“He always talked about how much he loved the Bronx. It was home to him. He should stay here,” she told Angela gently. “With you.” Darcy held Angela while she wept.

 

“Take care, sweetheart,” Angela said, as they both prepared to leave.

“You, too,” Darcy said. They’d watched his ashes go into the niche next to his father.

“You know, Billie Holiday is buried here,” Angela told her.

"He loved Billie Holiday," Darcy said.

"Did he?" Angela asked.

"Yeah," she said. "Body and Soul was his favorite." 

 

Darcy watched Angela walk to the car. Before she left, Darcy found Billie Holiday’s rectangular marker. People had left flowers. “Hail Mary, full of Grace,” she said, reading the inscription in the middle of the stone out loud.

 

***

 

When she got back to her apartment in DC, Dog met her at the door, toenails clattering on the wood floor. “What are you doing here?” Darcy said. “Did Thor drop you off?”

“I picked him up,” a voice said. Frank was sitting on her couch, drinking a beer. He smirked. “You did give me the code. Where you been?”

“Seeing my ex-mother-in-law,” Darcy said, taking off her shoes. “Also, where Billie Holiday is buried.”

“Billie Holiday, huh?” Frank said. “I don’t know that I’ve ever listened to her.”

“Really?” Darcy said, going to the fridge for wine. “Did you want to hear my favorite Billie song?” she asked. He nodded.

“Sure, Lewis,” he said. She fiddled with her phone. A few seconds later, a song was playing over the apartment’s speakers. “What’s this called?” Frank asked.

“I’m A Fool To Want You,” she told him.

“Not bad,” he said. Her playlist shifted. "Who's this?" he asked.

"Lana del Rey and John Lennon and Yoko Ono's kid," Darcy said.  

"Shit, really?" Frank said. "Sounds just like his dad."

"Uh-huh."

"I might like this better," he said. He stood up and slid his arms around her. 

“Frank Castle, are you dancing with me right now?” Darcy whispered.

“Shhh,” he said, his eyes locked on hers. Their faces were very close.  She swayed gently in his arms. "I don't know how long I'll be able to stay before the guilt," he began.

"Stay as long as you feel like," she told him, putting her head on his shoulder and inhaling the scent of cherry tobacco. "You can stay in the guest room," she said. He laughed.

"Oh, ouch, Lewis. I see where I rate."

 

 

-The End-

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title/mood inspiration:  
> God Knows I Tried: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxaq2Hn3U_k  
> Tomorrow Never Came (ft. Sean Ono Lennon): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CU8pjcgp8J8
> 
> Billie Holiday at St. Raymond's in the Bronx: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/489/billie-holiday
> 
> It was hard to write this ending, but here it is.


End file.
